Freshman shows promise early in season
It didn’t take long for freshman Chip Cox to burst onto South Carolina’s tennis scene.
In his first day of college competition, the Myrtle Beach native won both singles matches he played, one of them in very dramatic fashion.
After easily defeating Wofford’s Paul Bartholomy 6-1, 6-2 in the morning, Cox completed an improbable comeback against Elon’s Alberto Rojas.
“[Coach Josh Goffi] was just telling me, ‘You’re going to win the match,’” he said. “I got down 5-0 [in the second set], and I don’t think anyone thought I was going to win it then, not even me. But I just squeaked out a close game and then fought every game. That’s just the approach you have to take, I guess, to get back into it.”
Cox began playing tennis when he was four years old under the guidance of his father.
“I really got into it because my dad had always played with his friend, so my sister and I started playing when we were young,” he said. “My dad took us out there pretty much every day, and just hit balls for two hours. I started playing tournaments when I was ten and got good enough to go to college, and now I’m here.”
The choice to come to USC was an easy one for Cox, who is a chemistry major. The decision to begin this spring rather than in August has eased his transition to the university.
“It was one of my top schools to go to academically, so to come here and play tennis is just an amazing plus,” he said. “The coaches started talking to me over the summer, and [assistant coach Matt Lucas] came out there and watched all my matches at Kalamazoo, our national tournament. From there, I just fell in love with the place. My dad went here too, so – my family goes here, and it’s just a great school.
“It’s been really good for me to ease into it in the spring. I was planning on redshirting, actually, but I just decided to go out there and play, and try it. If I’m playing top six for the team, I definitely want to play singles.”
In spite of his early success, Cox’s goals for the season are centered around the team rather than around any individual benchmark.
“The rest of the season I just want to try my hardest and practice hard every day, go out there and try to win every match that I play,” Cox said. “Since I’ll be playing fourth or sixth for the season, I’ll have a good chance to do well. Hopefully as a team we can make it into the [NCAA] tournament, but we’ll see what happens.”