“Our biggest challenge has been to play consistent tennis throughout the season,” said Wauwatosa West’s Varsity tennis coach, Kosta Zervas. On May 15, Wauwatosa West’s JV tennis team took second in the Woodland Conference, while Varsity tied Greenfield for ninth four days later. Zervas said that a lot of hard practice during the off season is one of the main things needed to improve the consistency of how the team plays tennis. Even though this had not been their best season, many still enjoyed the experience.

Matt Stolz, a freshman playing for JV, said that the team helped him get better during his first season. He continued, and said that in addition to his own skills increasing, the team bettered as a whole. “I’m really glad I went out for the team,” Stolz said.

“JV made the greatest improvement since last season,” Zervas said. “A lot of our freshmen and sophomores did a great job too, which is encouraging for the future…I’m looking forward to seeing what our underclassmen have to offer, and am anxious to see what they can bring to our team.” Of the older players on the team, Zervas wishes to thank the seniors for four years of hard work.

The scoring of tennis is open to discussion. Most sources state that the love-15-30-40 system is based off of the face of the clock, meaning the game would be played for an hour long, involving 15, 30, 45, and 60. However, it would mean that winning the game could happen by chance, so ‘45’ was changed to ‘40’, and the idea of deuce was created, meaning another point must be scored in order to win. The word ‘love’ being used rather than ‘zero’ is thought to come from the French word l’oeuf, which means egg, because the numerical symbol for zero appears to be the shape of an egg. The origins of the game itself are questionable too, though the main thought is that it was derived from a game commonly played by monks. The French game, called jeu de paume, which started being played during the 11th or 12th century, is closely related to tennis, the main difference being that hands are used rather than racquets.