Prairie View A&M vs SMU
Styslinger/Altec Tennis Complex – Dallas, Texas
Jan. 12
Live Stats | Live Stream
Facebook | Twitter | Instagram
SMU Mobile App | Apple | Google Play

DALLAS – Three grad students. A pair of four-year seniors. Two redshirt juniors with four years of college experience. Four juniors and a trio of sophomores. No freshmen. 
 
Tennis teams hardly come any more veteran than the SMU men's roster. 
 
Entering the 2023 spring season, the Mustangs are loaded with players who have taken part in college tennis at the highest level for multiple years. They've been to the postseason and understand the commitment required to succeed. 
 
More importantly, they all have a hunger for something bigger. 
 
"Last year, we had one of the better seasons SMU has had in quite a while and we brought back a lot of our core guys and brought in a lot of older experienced guys that are going to play a really big role for us – and everybody on the team is a year older, so it's more experience," junior captain Adam Neff said. "While there's a lot of other teams that got better as well, if we can just kind of manage our work and go out there and have fun, we should set ourselves up to be in a pretty good position."
 
That good position is a far cry from where things stood just five seasons ago. Coach Grant Chen inherited a team that only won nine matches the year before he arrived and failed to pick up an American Athletic Conference regular season victory. While his first team won more matches (12) and did pull a conference tournament first-round upset, SMU still finished at the bottom of the AAC standings. 
 
The rebuild has been slow and steady, hampered by COVID cancellations and the restrictions that came with it. 
 
Last year, the Mustangs went 22-7 overall and won the AAC regular season and conference tournament titles, en route to the team's first NCAA postseason bid since 2017. SMU battled LSU to a heartbreaking 4-3 loss to end the season. 
 
The result is a far cry from a winless conference campaign, but both scenarios have played a key part in preparing the team for what's next. 
 
"There's a certain level of trust in my players knowing there's unfinished business. We really believe we had some opportunities that we let slip (against LSU)," Chen said. "I think they really have that chip on the shoulder to further what this program has done and it's been a really big transformation. We went from last in the conference back in 2018 to top of the conference this past year. The aura and mindset has really shifted. It's going to be a fun time to see what the next step is and where we go from here and the next level of what they accomplish."
Returners like Neff, Liam Krall and Julian Steinhausen highlight a roster of returning talent, along with a quartet of grad transfers from schools like UCLA, Texas A&M, South Florida and Michigan State, has SMU believing it can repeat last year's success and do even more. 
 
It all starts at 10 a.m. on Thursday with Prairie View A&M at the Syslinger/Altec Tennis Complex. 
 
When asked about the goals for the year, Neff spoke of things like playing for the guy next to you, focusing on doing the little things right both at practice and during a match, and not getting too far ahead. But even he admits hosting an NCAA regional in Dallas would be something the program would relish. 
 
Now, the Mustangs just have to earn it. 
 
"There's this old famous line that goes, 'It's hard to get to the top of the mountain – to stay is even harder.' I think that's the kind of idea of this season – we want to take it even further," Chen said. "And that's not just in the conference, but on a national scale and being able to assert ourselves as one of the top Texas schools and remain high in our conference."