Choboy hopes the third season is the charm
2/4/2005 12:00:00 AM | Men's Tennis
Feb. 4, 2005
BY TIM PEELER
RALEIGH -- When NC State athletics director Lee Fowler was looking for a new men's tennis coach a couple of years ago, he got a call from his counterpart at the University of Florida, Jeremy Foley.
Foley had called Fowler several times to talk about an assistant tennis coach for the Gators, Jon Choboy. After listening to Foley gush for nearly half an hour, Fowler had only one question: "Jeremy, is this guy your son-in-law?"
The answer, of course, is no, there is no relationship between Foley and Choboy, other than an admiration for a coach who has succeeded in turning around three collegiate programs and helped sustain Florida's success on the collegiate level.
Heading into Choboy's third season as the Wolfpack head coach, Fowler fully understands Foley's admiration. Fowler likes the way Choboy has rebuilt the program, restocked the roster and demanded the most out of the Wolfpack players, even though they were competing from a disadvantaged position since NC State was the only school in the ACC without an indoor tennis facility.
As the school gets ready for the official grand opening of the new 30,000 square foot J.W. Isenhour Tennis Center Feb. 18-20, things have turned around quite nicely under Choboy, the third-year coach who successfully built programs at Springfield College, Charleston Southern and Brown University.
When Choboy arrived in 2003, after four years at Brown, he had only four players on the roster. He recruited a walk-on through open tryouts at the school. Then, just weeks before the spring season was set to begin, the team's only newcomer, Val Banada, who had signed a letter of intent with the previous coaching staff, enrolled in school.
Throughout that first season, the Wolfpack competed with the minimum number of players. But it never forfeited or defaulted in a match because of injury or illness.
"It was a nerve-wracking experience," said Choboy, who had gone through a similar experience as head coach at Brown. "You could just step on a ball on the court and hurt your ankle. Anything can happen. The rule was -- and still is -- if it is not broken or torn, then you still play. We were very fortunate to have enough players to get through that."
Sure, it was a struggle to compete in the ACC, but that has been the case for many years. NC State hasn't had a winning ACC record in men's tennis since 1981, when Isenhour was still the Wolfpack's head coach. In fact, State has only had one overall winning season since 1988.
But Choboy went around the world looking for talent to bring to Raleigh. In his first recruiting season, he brought in 35 players for official visits, more than four times what most schools bring in. The next year, he brought in 20 players for official visits. Last year, he signed six of the seven players he brought in for officials visits.
Now, the Wolfpack is fully stocked with 14 players on the roster.
Heading into today's road match at Yale (2:30 p.m.) and a match Saturday against his old school Brown, Choboy has the Wolfpack off to its best start in 15 years. The men's tennis team has reeled off six straight wins, which is more victories than either of his first two Wolfpack teams had in an entire season. It started with back-to-back doubleheaders on Jan. 22 and 23, when the Pack beat High Point, Gardner-Webb, Davidson and The Citadel. Last weekend, in another double-header, State beat Louisiana-Lafayette and North Carolina A&T.
The Wolfpack has won 38 of its 42 matches this season, and Choboy has found a rising star in freshman Nick Cavaday to go along with senior All-ACC performer Conor Taylor. Cavaday is 4-0 so far this season in playing No. 1 and 2 singles. He and Will Shaw are 4-1 at No. 1 doubles.
Banada, now a junior, and sophomore Andre Iriarte are both still undefeated (3-0 and 4-0, respectively), as is freshman William Noblitt (6-0). In fact, the only player who has lost a singles match so far this year is Taylor, who is 2-2 playing in the No. 1 slot.
Choboy sees his team maturing, thanks to lots of playing experience and an influx of talent. Having a year-round practice facility doesn't hurt, either.
"I think we are already starting to make progress," said Choboy, who was a thee-time All-Conference player at Canisius. "We were able to work these kids and develop them by coming to this facility and working out. It's just common sense, the more you work in this game, which is about precision and timing, the better you will be.
"You can't improve in this game by thinking about it."
Choboy now wants to see tangible improvement on the court, after going 5-20 in his first year and 5-17 last season.
"By year No. 3, you have to start making a meaningful jump," Choboy said. "I may know how the program is improving, but it is a meaningful jump when people start to see some things happening, when the administration starts to see things happening. I have two recruiting classes in here now. We did lose a lot of practice time those first couple of years, so I feel we would be further ahead had we not lost that. That's neither here nor there.
"There has to be a jump ahead in year No. 3."
You may contact Tim Peeler at tim_peeler@ncsu.edu.
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