Samara hopes team is ready to go

West Virginia women's tennis head coach Tina Samara hopes to see her team in as good of shape as they were when they capped off their fall season on Oct. 23 when the Mountaineers travel to Ohio State to open up their spring season on Jan. 21.

"First and foremost hopefully (the team is) all ready to go and healthy and came back as fit as they left," Samara said. "We got to a good place when we finished the season, but they had a month off from any required tennis or working out.

"The number one thing is hoping that they are as healthy, if not better than when they left."

The spring season is more about where the team stands as a whole, rather than the fall season that concentrates mainly on individuals of the team participating in tournaments. Samara hopes team chemistry built upon during the fall season will continue to flourish as spring rolls on.

"Overall our team chemistry is a whole lot better," Samara said. "Hopefully that will show when we compete as a team because that is a huge part of college tennis.

"Spring tennis is not just how good everybody is in their individual spots, but how (the team) supports each other on and off the court."

When Samara was appointed as head coach at the beginning of the 2010 season, she embarked on a complete overhaul of the culture of West Virginia women's tennis. After a year and a half on the job, she is finally starting to see walls being built upon the foundation she is laying.

"(The team) is a lot more on the same page as far as what our goals are and what we need to do to get their," Samara said. "I think everybody now, which I don't feel was the case early on, really does want to win.

"(Winning) matters to them now."

Now that Samara has implemented a winning mentality within the team, she hopes to see her squad take it to the next level and produce victories on the court.

"It is a matter of competing now," Samara said. "Especially our younger kids, now have a much better understanding of the level and how competitive it is, and we are hoping to get a lot more wins from everybody."

When Samara took over as head coach, she understood that she had her work cut out for her. Although it may not have been as smooth a transition as she would have hoped, she is confident the new mentality of the Mountaineers is starting to show.

"I don't know that any coach ever thinks it is going as fast as we wanted it to," Samara said. "Realistically we have had a lot of turnover and I see all of it as positive turnover.

"I think we are in a pretty good place, and with the next recruiting class we will be in an even better place, so I expect this to be the beginning of those changes."