Ep. 17: Scoville Jenkins - Transition from Top Juniors to Pro Tennis

Alvin Owusu (00:05.875)
Hey guys and welcome back to another episode of the best of three podcast. I'm Alvin joined again by my main man, Torrey Hawkins. Torrey, how we doing tonight?

Torrey Hawkins (00:11.362)
Doing good, Alvin, doing real good, man. This is like reminisce, you know. I feel like it's awesome. I'm feeling good about the guest speaker. I'm feeling good. It's a new year, you know what I'm saying? And hey, it's good to be with you tonight. And Sco, awesome to have you, brother.

Scoville (00:34.878)
Alvin Owusu (00:34.879)
And I think the SCO that has been referenced a few times here on this podcast is actually here with us today. So I would like to say it as a man who needs no introduction, but I think this man does need a proper introduction. Torrey, I'm actually gonna let you introduce Mr. Scoble Jenkins.

Torrey Hawkins (00:49.965)
Oh man, I'm gonna give and I'm gonna have you help me scope because some of your accolades will probably trail me. I know I'm gonna speak to lot of the junior stuff. You can speak to a lot of your pro stuff. If I'm not mistaken, number one in the country, Kalamazoo champ, first black player to win nationals. Number four, think, ITF, if I remember correct, was one of your highest rankings.

had, I always say you carried Novak in that doubles, in that doubles team in Australia back in the day, getting ready for Australia. Alvin, small side note, I got a, my first and only coaching penalty in the no, in the Novak Djokovic Scoville Jenkins doubles match against Jocelyn Juana and Gail Monfils because a certain player was serving the ball so soft.

Alvin Owusu (01:47.7)
Hahaha

Torrey Hawkins (01:48.542)
and kept apologizing. I told Sco to move back. We're at an ITF grade A in the semis. And I'm telling my player to back up. And the ref dings me for coaching from the sidelines. They hit Sco probably

Scoville (02:06.556)
huh.

Torrey Hawkins (02:15.769)
getting the ding for telling him he's trying to do his best up there. But Novak Sir was like, man, sponge cake. I mean, I'm talking about straight up Margaritaville. And I tell you the truth, Alvin, that's a side note. That just shows you what I'm getting at. You can speak to it later when we're asking the questions. But I say that to say, obviously he had the five slams that I went to with him there at the US Open. He went to many others.

had set points on the doll in 05. I play that match every once in a while when I'm having a few extra beers. The most important part of it is one of the best players that I think the nation has seen. And I think he's a great person to have this on this talk show about the transition from top junior to pro. He did it well. He can speak to the perils of it. He can speak to having a coach that wasn't a top bona fide guy that helped get him there. I still feel like that's what held him back.

but I also feel like he reached the Wikipedia says 177, you might know better, whatever your highest was, and I don't know what your doubles ranking was, but bottom line, that's some pretty tall cotton to speak to on just the highlights of some of your rankings and some of your results.

Scoville (03:32.142)
I mean, that's an unbelievable introduction, T. I mean, I don't know what to say about that. I appreciate it. And I appreciate you guys having me here.

Torrey Hawkins (03:37.593)
Brother, you were there. You were there and I was there. Well, are. Pleasure's ours. Yeah.

Alvin Owusu (03:43.781)
It's it's yeah, it's great to have you it's great to have you and this is this is the first time like you know Obviously the podcast is called the best of three and usually we do this in straights But today we're going we're going we're going with three right we need a full third So this is this is this is gonna be fun And you know, let's go again. Thanks for joining with us and as th kind of you know talked about in the in the open there Really wanted to talk to you, you know as we get ready to roll into the Australian open, you know, things are kind of like, you

Torrey Hawkins (03:56.918)
up.

Alvin Owusu (04:13.844)
we're kicking off the, everyone's kicking off the coats, it's about to get real down under, but also, know, junior tennis is gonna kinda pick back up here, college tennis will pick back up in the next few weeks as well, but we wanted to really talk about the transition from high level juniors to moving into pro tennis, and so obviously, as TH mentioned, I think it was 2000, was it 2004 you won Kalamazoo, is that right?

Scoville (04:41.457)
It was, yes.

Alvin Owusu (04:42.997)
2004, I think I kinda wanna start there and Torrey, can help me out here. So if you win the event in 2004, maybe we go back two years, right, to age 16, if you were probably 18 at the time when you won it, maybe 17, but go back a couple years. What does it look like to go from, hey, I'm pretty good in the section,

Torrey Hawkins (04:51.233)
No.

Torrey Hawkins (05:01.111)
17, yeah.

Alvin Owusu (05:12.722)
to I'm making inroads on the national level. Obviously you then, had a nice run in the spring, summer, finished it off by winning Kalamazoo. Kind of take me from Kalamazoo, I guess maybe back two years, what was that process like of starting to realize that, okay, I can do something here with tennis all the way up to, okay, I'm on Stowe and I've won the damn thing.

Scoville (05:41.827)
Two years before that, I was really, really blessed and fortunate. First to my dad begged Torrey to take me on. That wasn't an easy thing. And my game at that time before that was like in limbo. It was, I could be a pretty good college player. I had some, I was pretty athletic, but I had some

some deficiencies for sure, but my athleticism kind of let me get away with it at times. But when I met Torrey, right away, my footwork picked up, my intensity for everything picked up, the competition around me was fierce. that was really practice at that time. In juniors, like my last two, three years, practice was a lot harder than any match I played.

Alvin Owusu (06:39.368)
Okay.

Scoville (06:39.65)
the match was just a little more nerves. But practice became, it became so intense, like matches were very easy.

Alvin Owusu (06:52.341)
Okay, so maybe help me put me there, I guess for the listeners who don't know you or don't know us, right? We were all in Atlanta at that time, right? You were over at East Point, TH was in East Cobb, I think at the time at UTA probably. those places aren't close to one another. So what was the decision making process, I guess, on the family side that said, hey, we need to move our training from

Torrey Hawkins (07:07.689)
Yep. Yep.

Alvin Owusu (07:22.864)
from East Point up to Marietta and then take me a little bit about like you mentioned that the practices picked up, what was that environment like over at, I mean I was at UTA around that time as well but I think that was right after I left because I graduated high school at 01 so this would have been like right after, maybe right after that.

Torrey Hawkins (07:35.956)
Right.

Scoville (07:41.931)
So I actually met Torrey through this other guy that Torrey coach called Nathan Sacks. And we all know Nathan Sacks. And we all have some great, maybe one other time we can tell some great Nathan Sacks stories. But those are some stories there. And we all have some Nathan Sacks stories.

Alvin Owusu (07:48.029)
This sucks.

Torrey Hawkins (07:50.548)
That will go down in my notes right now as our next episode right there on number six is the Nathan Sacks episode. What up, Nathan? Absolutely. What up, Nathan, if you're listening.

Alvin Owusu (08:00.757)
Hit that One-ey with your chest boy

Scoville (08:01.44)
You

Scoville (08:07.882)
So Nathan was always raving about this coach he had. And Nathan was a player that when I met him, I was not better than. He was someone I really looked up to as a player. He had pretty good work ethic. And it was someone I strived to want to be in his kind of caliber. remember, and Torres remembered this too, Nathan got invited to a USTA camp and I didn't. And that hurt.

Torrey Hawkins (08:35.987)
Scott was pissed. Yeah.

Scoville (08:37.247)
That hurt real bad. And so Nathan was, I met Nathan, was probably 11, 12 years old. And I didn't really get with Torch, I was like 14, I think.

Torrey Hawkins (08:50.886)
Yeah, we were you were training with us, but you were kind of and you were kind of doing some dual lessons with Nathan. We didn't really start doing privates Nathan till about 13 14 where you kind of started having your own lesson with me and whatnot. And because at that time couldn't get you up there in time. You know what I mean? It was just a logistical thing. Yeah, you're exactly right.

Scoville (09:10.182)
Yeah, my mom would, I went to, I went to a middle school right by the airport. So that was very far from a Chattahoochee plantation. But I went to a high school that was North Atlanta high school that wasn't that far away. So when I got to high school, I could, my mom could get me there a little faster. So I was able to get up there a little bit more. Torrey, Nathan, I would have these ridiculous Friday night sessions that were just, they were, you know,

Torrey Hawkins (09:37.265)
it out.

Scoville (09:40.357)
When you look back at things and you get, you're looking back and wow, how did I get better in this? It was times like that, you know, like we'd be out there from maybe 6 PM to midnight. There were times it was past midnight. and no one argued, no one complained. You know, the first time I ever beat Nathan was on one of those Friday nights. I think of it ever as a tournament. was that Friday night. I never forget that. and I remember

Torrey Hawkins (09:52.369)
Yep.

Torrey Hawkins (10:00.666)
I remember that.

Torrey Hawkins (10:08.123)
And let me interject. And they were one and two in the state and one and two in doubles, and one in doubles probably for the next five years too, Alvin. So just so you can appreciate how good the training was, Nathan had the upper hand early, Ossie Schoen had the upper hand late and continue to shift gears, you know what I mean, as he was going to do. But it was good for both of them. It became really a template. And need we forget.

Travis, know, Alvin, your younger brother at the time was probably one of the best serve and forehands the state of Georgia had seen in a long time. And he was putting a smack down on all the kids in the 12s. Travis Owusu was the absolute truth. And so these guys, it was a good field of guys. It was a good competitive group of kids. The South had a bumper crop that year with a lot of good players in it. You remember Bobby Cameron and obviously.

Alvin Owusu (10:48.562)
Yeah.

Torrey Hawkins (11:02.671)
Ben Rogers and many, others. Cole Gaston, I'll be in. Jermaine, we'd be the class ahead of you and the class that you had, let alone nationally. The guys like Phil and Alex was nuts off. And there was just so many good players that year. Nikita, you just keep going on and on about the top players. But I want you to finish, Skoh, but I just wanted to put in there, Skoh was good. He wasn't the top. And then as it went on,

He just kept getting better. mean, that was the real thing to me with Scoville. He just never stopped getting better. And that was, was scary in a way. It was like, wow, how good could this kid actually get? know, whatever I put in front of him, give him enough time and he'll, you know, he'll figure it out and raise, raise if anything, past the level.

Alvin Owusu (11:37.886)
What's up?

Alvin Owusu (11:51.541)
So Scott mentioned earlier that the, like as soon as it, like the first thing, one of the early things that happened there when the training increased, like you felt like your footwork was one of the things that got better. Did you feel like your game, footwork included, started to catch up with some of the maybe athletic advantages that you had over players? And if so, was that the thing that started to help you put together more wins at the higher level?

Scoville (12:17.348)
Well, I didn't know at the time, but if we all know Tor, that's his specialty is the footwork. And you know, at that time he was so, I mean, we're doing footwork before practice, after practice, during practice, like it was all in constant. And I just went with what he said. I had no idea any of this open stands or semi or any kind of thing he was telling me trying to do. I would just go with it and

I mean, we wouldn't work on like sliding, uh, second serves, like kicking the foot up, like a, the, the rat, saffron hitting back. And we were working on like this stuff. And it was, as I get older and realize now it's just about leverage. And like that was just, I noticed what Torrey, like he wanted me to hold the baseline. I controlled the baseline. I'm on the ball. Like I'm behind every ball taking just these.

Alvin Owusu (13:03.945)
What do mean leverage?

Scoville (13:15.692)
cuts and then like I'm a very quick player but I can just stay in there in there in there all day long and just move next ball move next ball it was it was just that rhythm and that's what it felt like being a rhythm a lot just so then that became as the you get older and people start hitting harder and

you start to pick it up and you're growing, it became a little, not say easier, but I became, had something I could really concentrate on. If my feet are on time, I'm going to be on time. But then that, when I say I was so lucky, someone like Brian Vahaly had just graduated Virginia and he was coming to Torrey. And I remember Torrey sitting me down and was like, listen, this guy's coming to me here and I'm going to use you. You're going to hit with him. Do not be messing around.

give him the best practice. You want him coming to ask you to practice over and over. And at that time, I was nowhere near a Brian Vahaly level. Like he was doing me a favor, hitting with me that early, like doing me a complete favor. But I did whatever Torrey asked me to do. I did whatever Brian asked me to do. I met Brian from high school one time to play with him. I mean, I just did whatever they said. And then just like,

Alvin Owusu (14:18.601)
Right.

Yeah, yeah.

Torrey Hawkins (14:32.906)
Yeah.

Alvin Owusu (14:33.714)
haha

Scoville (14:39.4)
I caught up to the speed and then you could see the footwork because the first thing I realized with Brian was like, my God, he hits a humongous ball and it's every time. Like I can't keep up with this.

Torrey Hawkins (14:50.61)
Yeah. Especially on that backhand side. I mean, he could rifle a backhand. I mean, if you weren't ready, if you weren't on balance, I mean, it would literally move you. I mean, it would literally move you off the court. I remember a couple of times hitting some slice and I sliced through and I felt like I was being pushed like, you know, somebody had leaned into me. I was like, and I'm a big guy. You know, I'm like, man, that ball's got something on it. You know what I mean? So to your points go, that was that was.

You caught up and you were probably what 14, 15? Because you and Brian got a considerable age difference because you and Bobby are. You and Bobby Reynolds are a few years apart. I to say four years. So I know Brian was a couple years older than Bobby. two points. I want to go back to Alvin's point. Alvin, started working together about, me and Scott started working together about 12. A little more part time. He was starting to come to UTA. He was starting to do some more lessons. About 13, really started going strong. You mentioned two years before Kalamazoo.

So I want to kind of fast forward a little bit to kind of keep us on track. Scoville got third place in 16th Kalamazoo. And you heard it right here. My opinion really should have probably could have won Kalamazoo that year at 16th. I'm biased, of course, but just saying he was playing that well. You had a tough match against the guy named Timothy Neely. There was some there was some antics and whatnot before the match, but long story.

Neely would go on to lose to, what was your boy's name? Skoll played at Texas, white kid. Hagelson, Travis, Travis Hagelson. And no, no, no, you played Vaheed, sorry. You played Vaheed in that semi and Vaheed lost to Travis in this and you in a plan. it Ken Kale or Phillip Kale? was it? Phillip Kale, right.

Scoville (16:21.492)
Hegelson?

Scoville (16:25.694)
That was Vaheed.

Scoville (16:38.228)
Yeah, I it was Philip King.

Torrey Hawkins (16:42.407)
And Alvin, when I tell you he beat Phil, Phil was a great player in the juniors while playing for the 3-4 playoff for Kalamazoo. ain't no slouch. And he, Sco, beat the breaks off of Phil, Phil Cale, probably 2-1, 1-1. I it was, I think it was 2-1 if I'm not mistaken, maybe 3-1. Going away. And I was saying to myself, his bet, and probably a little pissed off from the Vaheed match. And Vaheed went on to play top at Florida. Travis went on to play top at Georgia. I think at Texas, I think he transferred, didn't he, from?

Texas to Georgia or Georgia to Texas.

Scoville (17:12.615)
He went. Then by he played at Florida State.

Torrey Hawkins (17:16.487)
And Bob played for the state. Just play, I mean, some great, great tennis all the way around for these guys. But I say it to say that was two years before and he was already starting to kind of prove himself at Kalamazoo. A funny story. Skoh lost at our state qualifier in the semis. Took fourth place in his own state qualifier. Am I right, Skoh?

Scoville (17:42.538)
I was just talking to Colt about that. Me and Colt, who I lost to, we were on vacation in Destin with our kids. And then I was talking about that. I was like, God, that state qualifier, I lost to you. You just took me out. You just served me off the court in the third set. And then your man just beat me down. Like.

Torrey Hawkins (17:44.762)
Yeah. Yeah.

Torrey Hawkins (17:57.219)
Yep. And then he lost to Jermaine, you know, and he lost to Jermaine and he took fourth. He had fourth in his own qualifier. Then he gets to the Southern's, loses to Jermaine and then he gets third in the country. And I catch it like, you got to be kidding. I'm like, dude, our state's rough right now. Right?

Alvin Owusu (17:59.903)
You

Scoville (18:09.647)
Again in the-

Alvin Owusu (18:19.102)
better at hardcore gnats than he did at Macon

Torrey Hawkins (18:24.12)
Dude, but that just shows, again, to my point about how tough the age groups were. I mean, it was tough, man, and I think all of you improved as a result. Dude, it was you went into making in those days, You had to be ready because...

Scoville (18:38.225)
You had even Southern's. remember you guys remember, of course, Steve Nash and I every I played him two or three times. It was always three sets, dogfight matches like every, every single time. Like I had to literally he was like a dog out there. I had to give him everything I had. We were going three. Those were like first, second rounds of like sexual tournaments. You know, it was.

Torrey Hawkins (18:44.491)
Of course.

Torrey Hawkins (18:50.052)
100%.

Torrey Hawkins (19:02.113)
Right. Right.

Alvin Owusu (19:05.045)
And the Southern section is interesting in like, you know, it's a collection of, you know, multiple states. I think it's 12 or 13 states. And Georgia in itself is extremely, I'm not sure about now, but at that time was an extremely competitive state, right? Like as competitive as other states that were big enough to have their own sections, right? Like Texas has its own section. I would say Georgia is as good, was as good of a state as Texas was as a section. Florida has its own section.

Torrey Hawkins (19:32.971)
Right. Right.

Alvin Owusu (19:35.15)
but you're talking about, know, you're losing to players like, like Jermaine Jenkins and, you know, Colt Gaston in the state qualifier. These guys all go on to play, you know, top level, you know, division one tennis as well. Like no joke, just to get out of the state to then go on to the section before sectionals.

Torrey Hawkins (19:43.852)
Right.

Torrey Hawkins (19:53.366)
before the section, 100%, 100%. And I'm gonna add on top of that, the irony was, a lot of us worked together, I worked so much with for long period of time, and obviously Jermaine, but each of them had their own personal rivalry. So going back to answer your question, I was about two years before winning the zoo, the year after 16th, he took a tough loss to a guy named Keane Feeder, who by the way was the two seed, so it wasn't like it was a bad loss, kids good himself.

And it's one of those matches where you realize, well, shoot, I'm good, but everybody else is too. And I think it was one of those matches where to see him then rebound. And he had a pretty good 2004, through that year Australia. I mentioned the match in the outset about the Novak doubles match and this and that. Played Monfils in the quarters, obviously, in Australia. Had some great matches. Mowgethub had some really in the blues into.

Did you lose to Baghdadis that year or was the first two years you lost to Baghdadis in the quarters of US Open, Junior Scho in those years? I want to see your first two years, what you lost to Baghdadis and kind of back to back.

Scoville (21:00.461)
Yeah, was first year, and then the second year was in the quarterfinals.

Torrey Hawkins (21:04.577)
Right, in the quarters, and again, but literally Alvin, mean, and hey, Baghdadis was one of the world at that time, you know what I mean? 18 months later, Baghdadis was top 10 of the world. So, my point being, you can really see some of the way things were going there. Osceousko had a great 2004, Kalamazoo was almost, I'm not gonna say an afterthought, because it was certainly a heck of a tournament. Skow had a great tournament, answered a lot of people that kind of questioned him, had a lot of players that he hadn't beaten before.

including Phil Simmons, including Matt Brooke and other players who were some top juniors back in the day. But I say it to say that two year span, he really grew, he really grew into himself, really got comfortable on the court, in my opinion. Skills were there, skills were always there. They got more polished. Stovall started to really own and have a presence on the court. And you know how junior tennis can be, know, a lot of times your presence and your, you know, your ranking, your

your who you are almost precedes you. You know what I mean? And I think, but you gotta earn that. People aren't just giving that to you. And there's a guy that you had to beat to be the man now. And so from the Brendan Evans types to my main man, Kalamazoo's finest, Scott Algema, you know what I mean? And others, mean, obviously, and Algema who was a Kalamazoo native and

Phil Simmons who I thought and you know I say this to you, Scott, you know what I'm talking about. Phil was a little better athlete than Scoville, you know what I mean? And just a phenomenal athlete, good move on the court. He was, in my opinion, the best black player in the country at that time here from the States. And they had never played, you know, due to whatever reason. And so that was a match they both played together. That was a big match for both of them. Was that quarters or semis? I can't remember, was that semis?

Scoville (22:54.175)
He beat Wayne Odessig, which was a big upset.

Torrey Hawkins (22:56.285)
Yeah, yeah. And Wayne had already gone pro and that's my, so again, that tournament was rife. So I say, it's not to say that it was a, it certainly wasn't a walkover by any means, but by that point, Skoh got quarters of Australia, same as the doubles with Novak. I like to say he kind of carried Novak. I'd love to get Novak on this show one time and just to get his thoughts on that. I'm not saying it because it's Skoh. He literally carried him in that tournament. Novak had returns and a backhand and that's about it.

Scoville (23:23.628)
Torrey Hawkins (23:24.574)
No, and I don't say that and I don't say anything bad about Novak. The brother is bad. I mean, the best player, the goat, in my opinion, we've talked about him score on previous episodes, the absolute goat. can see there's no denying it. Period of story. But I say that to say, Skoll got same as the Wimbledon and with the the hurt hamstring, might have played Monfils in the final, would have been the first all black men's final in Wimbledon. That was a that was a that was that one hurt me because just for the history of it all, obviously, quarters in US.

a second time in a row and got to around 16th of the French, but only because again, a long match at winning Astrid Vaud before that took him a few matches deep and probably didn't have quite the recovery that other players had. So all I'll that to say had a great banner year and the thing I wanna add to this last part before we move on to the pro part, and this was really his first year playing the ITFs. It wasn't like he had a previous year where he did this and that, and then this was his follow-up year.

Australia was the first time, know, French was the first time, Wemby the first time, and they're all these terms. played USO, well, but junior before because he obviously did so well in Kalamazoo, but he had not played the others very much. And so that to me was a big deal for a player for the first time. And we've had other players that have played that tournament two, three times and gotten the second, third round. And you're like, hey, nice job. But take a player who did it once and got to the quarters or semis. That's a big deal. So anyway,

Alvin Owusu (24:50.773)
So let's, yeah, let's start from that. So just to put it in a chronological order, let's say you win the event in July of 2004, so go back to the US Open 2003, right? So August 2003, you do well junior US Open there. Funny enough, I run into you, I'm three or four years older than you, and I remember I came home from fall break and I was helping,

Torrey Hawkins (24:51.316)
With that said, we can kind of segue a little bit.

Scoville (24:59.432)
Mm-hmm.

Alvin Owusu (25:18.612)
helping out Torrey at a North Fulton tennis center. And I'm calling it North Fulton tennis center. Cause if your mama called you North Fulton, I'm gonna call you North Fulton. And I remember I'm out there with some of the kids and I'm in college at the time. Like I've hit a decent ball at that time. I'm a junior in college. shows up to practice and Torrey's like, Hey, you wanna jump over there and warm up Sco. And I'm like, all right, well, Sco's my brother's age. Ain't no big deal. I know he's good. We warm up short. We're warming up short. And I'm like, oh shit. What is about, what is happening? What is this?

Scoville (25:24.935)
You

Alvin Owusu (25:47.893)
And needless to say, you then you just come off of doing well at the US Open. You're about to take off and, you know, this is October, you're about to go to Australia in a couple of months. And like, you're in this place where like your professional career is starting now, right? You are, obviously you end up winning, winning Kalamazoo nine months later, but like, and that was the beginning of it. And I even to this day, I'm like, I don't, I don't know what I was doing out there. I can't warm up this kid. Like he's, this kid is a full on professional tennis player here.

So you're moving from the highest levels of junior tennis, doing progressively better that year, moving into the summer of 2004 where the, Kalamazoo is gonna happen, it's gonna almost become somewhat of an afterthought. I wanna know about your decision making process of like, okay, you mentioned earlier you thought you could be a good high level tennis player in college, but now how is that calculus changing and what were some of the things that made you go, okay maybe college isn't.

isn't for me right now, I need to go do this.

Scoville (26:51.125)
man, after, so that 2003, June US Open, I played, I lost to Big Dad is second round. I went through some really tough qualifying matches and there were some really good matches. First round, but Jarrett Chirico played at UVA. He was a top 50 ITF kid at that time. But when I played Big Dad is I really shocked myself. Like I went seven, six, six, one or six, two and to go seven, six and like have chances to win the first. I shocked myself.

there. did not know what I was going into that junior US Open. It was just like, I know I'm good. I know I can play. But then I was like, I think I can play with the best in the world here. Like, I remember being up close and seeing these guys I watched on TV and I was like, they don't hit that big. You know, like, I remember just seeing like the first time those P12345 practice courts and watching these guys hitting I was like,

Alvin Owusu (27:41.012)
Mmm.

Scoville (27:49.208)
They don't look that amazing as like I pictured or I'm watching on TV.

Alvin Owusu (27:53.126)
Right. Like who? Like do you have anybody in mind that you can think of when you're making that statement?

Torrey Hawkins (27:54.072)
Right.

Scoville (28:00.292)
So one person who is one of my favorite tennis players, the first, he was kind of when I remember that 2000's US, junior US Open, he was one of the best players in the world at that time. He was the first person I saw hit on that practice court was Layton Hewitt. And the first thing I saw was like, he doesn't hit the ball that hard actually at all. Because as a junior, you're thinking these pros just smack the crap out of the ball. Don't. I was like, he hit the ball that hard. I think he maybe, either won it or he finally lost to Roger or something like that. He was still top three, four in the world.

Alvin Owusu (28:11.892)
Mmm

Torrey Hawkins (28:19.906)
Yep. Yep.

Alvin Owusu (28:29.94)
2003, yeah that was that, it's like 617661 like drugging in the fight, yeah, yeah, yeah.

Scoville (28:35.659)
Yeah. But it was, and then I started, I started to mix in some futures as well. And it wasn't really that successful in the beginning with the futures, like losing the qualities. Like I wasn't really getting main draw very much. but like you tell juniors each, all these matches I was playing, I was just getting better. and I was learning from them.

And I was just learning how, and I was watching how these top players, junior players, top college players, how they would carry themselves on and off the court. As a junior, I won a lot. So when I lost, it was pretty like upsetting, you know, like, and as a professional early on, you're losing quite often. You have to learn how to lose and move on and learn from it and move on. And that was something that was pretty hard. you're a really successful junior and

Because as a junior player, you're like, I'm the best in the world. That's going to translate to the pros. I'm going to be the best in the world there too, because I'm going semis at Junior Wimbledon. I'm going semis of all these tournaments. I'm winning futures, all this stuff at my young age. Of course it's going to happen. then it's kind of, the pro and the juniors is so...

You know, everybody that I played with in juniors, I almost played with the same ones in pro. Like I'm the same with, with Jokovic, with Murray, Manfi. Um, you got like a Pablo and Duhar, Fabio Fagnini, know, guys like that, you know, like I seen him. Yep. Samba like you see, you see all these guys and then like,

Torrey Hawkins (30:09.993)
Yup. Yup.

Torrey Hawkins (30:14.996)
Yeah.

Juan,

Scoville (30:29.025)
You know, everybody as a junior, you're in a locker room and you all want to go pro. Everybody wants to be a pro and everybody thinks they're going to be the best ever. You know, but we really, those junior slams, they're actually a false sense. Like.

Alvin Owusu (30:44.723)
What do mean?

Scoville (30:47.314)
It's great to play them. It's great to be, you know, top 10, whatever in the world. But that doesn't mean you're going to be a pro. It's actually like, doesn't show anything. You know, it just shows that you can play with these players. You know, the next step is your mental, you know, and what you have around you, you know, the team around you, what country are you from? This all matters now.

The wild cards, your tournament schedule, what surface you'd like to play on. You know, in 2003, 2004 was a lot different than now. Like tournaments were scarce, especially challengers after Australian Open. So you had to really make sure you had a good schedule and you weren't missing out.

Alvin Owusu (31:37.524)
So when you say the challenges, okay so that's really interesting. So I'll show you an open wraps up, let's call it February 1st. So from February until about when did you feel like there was, when you say there was a lack of challenges for American players, like within the United States, or lack of challengers kind of everywhere.

Scoville (31:58.654)
So right after the US opened, I mean, excuse me, Australia opened, the ATP, you go, you had the 500 in Memphis, 500 is very hard to get into. I mean, you have to be top 150 to get into Qualys.

Alvin Owusu (32:07.976)
Yeah. Yeah.

Torrey Hawkins (32:09.66)
Yep. Right. It was done near a low-level ATP event.

Scoville (32:14.494)
Yeah. The San Jose's, those were hard to get into. And then if you go up to Europe, the Rotterdam's, I mean, Rotterdam is like ridiculous. It's like top 80 to get into Rotterdam. And then there's just places like Morocco, they have some stuff or South America. But do you really want to go mess with those guys like that down there? Like it's just another level. And this is another thing to mess with these red clay quarters that just play on the red clay all year long. And so

The challengers, I remember at that time, right around like Memphis, San Jose, had some stuff in Mexico, but it's altitude. It's tough. I remember one time I went to go play challenger and carpet, Serbia carpet in Germany. And then on this slow indoor court, I played like Manarino on this indoor court in France. And yeah, that was my first taste of Manarino.

Alvin Owusu (33:07.38)
Oof.

Torrey Hawkins (33:11.012)
Hehehehehe

Scoville (33:12.806)
Ball didn't bounce and I was like, yeah, ball not coming up at all. And so the carpet, that was my first time playing on carpet and I think I did my best, but I was just like not ready to play on carpet, not ready for what that brought. The first week I had to really learn how to play on it. I had to learn these kickstarts aren't gonna work here on this carpet. I gotta figure out how to serve here. And so like your schedule just becomes so...

Alvin Owusu (33:14.024)
But that ball's not coming up at all.

Torrey Hawkins (33:33.232)
Right. Right.

Scoville (33:39.384)
Important when you're a good junior really good junior ITF junior. You're kind of playing a pro schedule a little

Torrey Hawkins (33:45.092)
They really are. That's a good point. Because their schedule matches the pros. know what I mean? Surfaces, the big ones, yeah.

Scoville (33:50.618)
Yeah, you're gearing up for these slams and there's always something before the slam. You're just gearing up to do your best at these slams here.

Torrey Hawkins (34:03.006)
And to your points go, and you know you're in because your points, your ranking, you're in that tournament. So you know your schedule. And I think to your point, and Alvin, I'll chime in with him a little bit on that. In that time, Pro Circuit was taking over and the future, the satellites were going away and the Pro Circuit was just coming in. They had a lot of low level events. They didn't have a lot of mid level. They had a lot of high level challengers, a ton. I do mean a ton.

of futures used to be the satellites where you'd play three or two and then you'd get points to get into the true satellite, which was almost they almost really were like three qualifying in a sense events that put you into the big satellite tournament. That format went away because they said guys couldn't be off for three, four straight weeks the whole time to play. But unfortunately, while they inundated with futures, there was too little money and too few points. And then the challengers, you went from a

$10,000 total purse future to a 150 plus H challenger or a 500 plus H challenger. There was no middle ground. And then over the next few years, they brought in $50,000 challenges, 100,000 plus H. And even those are pretty strong, but there weren't even that many of those. And Scott, you can chime in on that, there was just, I felt there was, they almost had a lot of single A, a couple of double A, no triple A.

or maybe one or two, and then it was all ATP after that. And again, for the guy trying to make it at that time, if you didn't have a wild card, buddy, you know, it was, was tough sledding. It was very tough sledding.

Scoville (35:41.753)
Yeah. And at those times, like those futures in Europe and France, hard to get into ridiculous competition as well. Like Europe, they had more stuff, but the competition was fierce there. A lot of clay courts, just stuff that like for Americans, for us, like, you know, like the clay time season is we take us to play season, we play our best in the hard courts. So we're for hard courts at all times.

Torrey Hawkins (36:07.117)
Right. Right.

Alvin Owusu (36:08.532)
And so kind of, guess maybe taking this a little bit, a little bit of a tangent here. So these pro-circuit events, as I understand them now, the USTA has done a really good job of beefing them up here in the States via some of the college, some of the universities, right? They have more of these particular events on campus, which also, you know, it's very attractive for college players to be able to play in these events without having to leave, you know, leave the United States.

Torrey Hawkins (36:33.835)
Right. Right. And recruiting. Right. And recruiting for the college itself.

Alvin Owusu (36:39.445)
Yeah, so I kind of wanted to, you know, maybe segue a little bit to the other half of your, you know, your tennis background. spent, you know, maybe the better part of 10 years as an assistant coach here in the States for a few different universities. Do you feel that players now who show that promise, maybe the exact same position you were in when you were, you know, 17, 18 years old, having to kind of make that transition from the ITF

know, the ITF tournaments into these pro circuit events, if you had to do it all over again, do you feel like college players now going the college route, they're better served than you were at that point in time?

Scoville (37:20.213)
I think these colleges now have resources that are unbelievable and they were way better now than they were when I was coming up. You know, when I was coming up, if you were, if you were ready to play, you wouldn't play pro. Like that was just it. Like college was kind of like, I don't know, maybe you're ready, but I remember Torrey wanted me to go to college. You know, I took some visits and he kind of,

I remember Tory was pushing like, don't put college to the side. Like give it a true thought here, you know? And it was more of like, you can still play, you know, you can develop as a person, you know, you can see some new things, but you can still get the high level competition. But I always tell kids like going from, if you're going from juniors, picking from pro to co or go to college, it should be clear.

as in the money should tell you what to do. If you're getting contracts and money, you're going to go pro. Because professionals get paid. So if you're getting offered contracts, then you're professional. But if there's no money, if you're not from a country that has resources, the coaching, where you're going to train, then it's pretty clear to me. It's either I have what I can do to make it because it's so hard.

or I need more time or I need more resources and then it should be a pretty clear answer.

Alvin Owusu (38:55.657)
So on the resource side, you mentioned the schools now have resources, right? More resources. You mentioned right now if a player's coming out and having that decision between GoPro and go to college, they should be getting money from, I guess maybe sponsors, whether that be clothing or rackets or whatever. And then you said some of the other countries are better resources. Well, when you say resources, what do you?

Torrey Hawkins (38:55.785)
That's a good way of saying it.

Alvin Owusu (39:24.478)
Can you break that down a little bit maybe across those particular categories, like from the colleges to the countries and federations to resources for an individual player on tour?

Scoville (39:34.654)
So good examples, a country like Czech Republic, pretty small country, but tennis wise, humongous, men and women country. I coached a few of them when I was at, I coached in college at the different schools I was at. So I went over there a lot in the summer recruiting. And I remember going over specifically to this one club called CLTK, beautiful club. They have a stadium to host like, they've hosted Davin's Cup there, they've hosted ATP events.

Alvin Owusu (40:02.665)
That's in Prague, right? Is that right there on the water? on the the lit? Yeah, I was in Prague last summer. So yeah, I know which one you're talking about.

Scoville (40:03.685)
Improved, yep. Right there, yep.

Beautiful, beautiful place. They've hosted. I've been there watching the Challenger, Davis Cup, Fed Cup, the pros that play out of there. So I've gone there a couple of times and watched a few different kids practice. So I remember one particular time I came to watch a kid practice. This was in the winter, probably January in the winter. And I went there playing inside and I noticed there was like one coach for every two courts, but

Alvin Owusu (40:15.38)
WTA event, yep.

Scoville (40:38.525)
There was nothing, nobody was messing around. You could tell the level based on the court. Who was who, who was what. The kid I was actually watching, was playing with a, he was playing with a pro at the time, I forget his name, but he was like around 100, 150 or something like that. And he wasn't bringing it. And that kid, that coach kicked him off the court. And I remembered this because I was like, I need to watch this kid play. And he's like, you're just.

This is like an honor to be out here and you're not bringing it today. So you got to go. I got to get somebody else. And there was no conversation. There was no like, what are you talking about? It was. So I say that to say I can't say I'm Czech Republic that coaching like that. Like, you know, that's pretty good backing right there. You're going to get like, I've seen this great coaches there now as far, I don't know what the federation does financially for them or anything like that, but.

I coached a kid at Oklahoma State who was one in doubles and top five in singles from Czech Republic. And he would just tell me the stuff they would do in practice and how they worked. And I was like, no wonder this country produces so many good players. Like it's just no BS, you know?

Alvin Owusu (41:51.912)
And is that like, is that set up like, would it be the equivalent to one of our like, national training centers or would it be more of an equivalent to like, one of our private academies? Okay, okay.

Scoville (42:01.102)
One of the private academies. This was a club like, you know, some of these countries like that, you're either well off and you're not. You know, so this is a, it's a very nice club and you know, a lot of these kids would go here, like they produce so many good players, you know, so they come here and there's just so much to hit with, but there's just no messing around here. And then there's each stages for coaches like,

you move on the stage as the next coach in this next group. And I just remember watching like these practices. like, I'm like, if you're coming with this intensity every day, like you can just get better.

Scoville (42:45.572)
And then there, then, sorry. Then there's the aspect of the club matches they get to play, which is very competitive and it's very, it can be very lucrative, but that's also a way of them getting matches. Like that's one thing I think we lack here is the matches.

Torrey Hawkins (42:45.699)
I'll... I'll... Go ahead, let's go. No, no, please.

Alvin Owusu (43:03.443)
Yeah, yeah. If you could explain the club system a little bit in Europe, because I found out about this very recently, maybe in the last nine months, that they have, each club has effectively a team of X amount of players and they're playing against other clubs, that they're playing for money and you get a lot of your lower ranked professional players. Also, someone who's 300 in the world is actually playing on, you

the Cherokee club or whatever and they're making money which allows them to travel a little bit more. Is that about the right read?

Scoville (43:38.03)
It is. I recruited a player. went to watch his club match in Denmark one time and Yako Nimanin was a player on his team. Now the team he was on wasn't good enough for Jarkko Nieminen to come out and play. But that's the level like that you're watching is there's a professional on all these teams and they're getting like some of these clubs get like 10,000 people to come out and watch these matches.

Alvin Owusu (43:51.646)
Okay.

Alvin Owusu (44:03.581)
wow.

Scoville (44:04.866)
That's a pretty good environment. Like they want to win.

Torrey Hawkins (44:09.289)
Right. Right. I was going to say, Scott, and this is where my tangents kind of come in as what you're describing to me. And I've heard about the Bundesliga for a long time in Germany and all the not just the level, but in the money, but also the preparation. You're you're being groomed, you know, to be the next top player or to be with that next top player. I mean, when I was playing way back in in the early 90s, our top player, Georgia State.

played club tennis and was on the Davis Cup team for what was then Yugoslavia. And he was, you know, he was behind guys like Ivanezic and guys like who was the guy that played right behind him? He didn't play very long, not Cilic, but similar player, smooth game. Mario Ancic, thank you, Mario Ancic. And so, and this guy was number three on that team coming from Yugoslavia. So look at the level he's seen. And he, used to talk about all the time and he would just say,

Scoville (44:52.83)
ancient Mario ancient

Torrey Hawkins (45:04.863)
You just don't understand. He was like in Europe, he was like, there's pro tennis, there's a pro tennis circuit in Europe. And then there's, you know, and then there's club level. And then there's the ATP. He was almost like, like the club tennis was was that strong, you know what I mean? So he was like, we just a lot of us just can't afford to go travel outside of Europe, he says. But in Europe, club level is the club level is where it's at, you know. And so here, this kid was probably, you know, 250, give or take ATP, but not not making enough money to travel.

but was well taken care of over there and just came over here just to go to school. And so I say it to say, the question I have for you, and then I've got a couple of these kind of rapid fire questions for you.

What is, is the American junior ready for top college? Seeing as how he misses that, right? Doesn't necessarily have that. It kind of skips that a little bit. Doesn't have it. Is the American top American, you know, the top 20, top 50 even American junior really ready for top college tennis?

Scoville (46:07.156)
think it depends. Now what the Americans do have is they already played a lot of team sports. So they understand the team aspect a little bit. Some of the Europeans, sometimes it takes them a while to understand the team aspect. As far as like, this guy threw his racket on court six, we're all running. Well, he threw his racket, why am I running? know, like you can, sometimes they don't understand the team aspect of some stuff.

Um, and I'm not saying that's all of them, but sometimes the Americans get the team a little faster. It's just, I can want the tournament you play. I'd say if you're, if you're a player, you don't play a lot, you're not going to be ready. Um, but it just depends on how much you play. I tell kids all the time in college, I go the best time you can get better here in school when you're in school is in the summer when, when school's not bringing you down mentally. So like.

Torrey Hawkins (46:43.007)
Thanks.

Torrey Hawkins (46:46.687)
Okay.

Torrey Hawkins (47:01.424)
Right. Right.

Scoville (47:03.089)
Like someone like Ty Tucker, when these kids come on a visit, he asked them, what are you doing this summer? And he waits for them to say that. says, you're either playing a title tournament all summer or you're here with me and I'm going to work you out to twice a day all day and get you better much, And the Europe.

Torrey Hawkins (47:15.994)
Right.

Right.

which is why Ohio State has always been one of the top teams, peered in a story every year. Right.

Alvin Owusu (47:24.532)
every year.

Scoville (47:27.003)
Every European I've ever coached in college every summer, they're going back and playing tons of club matches, just tons, tons of club matches. And the only time the Americans play a ton of matches in the US, if they have pro aspirations. That's it.

Torrey Hawkins (47:41.55)
And see, and they're alone, as you say, the cream is kind of rising to the top. My follow up question.

Is the ITF, and I'm talking junior ITF, is it a true pathway to help kids either do go pro or do you feel the college pathway is actually superior to? What are your thoughts? And I want to clarify, to get you ready for pro tennis.

Scoville (48:12.432)
Now

Scoville (48:18.375)
Now there are some things that are different in both the ITF and college now. I think if you hit certain rankings in college, you're getting wild cards, like multiple wild cards. If you hit rankings in ITF, you're getting multiple challenger future. I mean, multiple challenger future. If you hit certain.

Torrey Hawkins (48:27.644)
Okay, that's good.

Torrey Hawkins (48:34.937)
Gotcha. Right. Much needed. They never used to have that. That was always something that I felt was much needed. Yeah.

Scoville (48:39.467)
So, yes. I think that's amazing, they're doing that. And giving these kids, because if, I do believe if you're showing you're one of the best in the world, like give them a chance at some of these wild cards, see if you can play at this lower level, pro events here. Man, I've met, there's certain countries, if you're from Germany, you don't need to play ITFs. If you're from France, you don't need to play ITFs. Australia, you don't need play ITFs.

Torrey Hawkins (49:03.45)
Why?

Scoville (49:07.319)
You the competition is very good. You don't need to leave that country in Germany. When I was recruiting kids from Germany, I was recruiting them on men's national ranking scale. So I work with down here with a guy, Tobias Clemens played at UCLA. Very good player, four time All-American. I think the top 200 ATP in the world. I asked him, did you play like ITS the kid? No. Did you homeschool? No.

Torrey Hawkins (49:11.118)
Wow.

Torrey Hawkins (49:19.171)
Okay.

Scoville (49:34.629)
I go, well, how did you get, I go, did you go to like a, did you go play first and show these coaches you could play? Like what was your junior German ranking? Like how'd you go to UCLA out of high school? His German ranking was like, I think he said it was like 20 or 30, which was that's extremely high for men's national German ranking. I'll give you how high that is. When I was coaching at Wisconsin, if your men's German national ranking was around 120, 125, that meant you're going to probably be a pretty good college player. And he was like third.

Torrey Hawkins (49:50.67)
Right.

Torrey Hawkins (50:02.926)
Wow, so he was 20. Wow.

Scoville (50:04.229)
It's like 30 or 20.

Alvin Owusu (50:06.472)
And so is that a ranking system in Germany where they're taking like every man who plays high level 10, like Zverev is number one. Yeah.

Torrey Hawkins (50:11.982)
You're right. Zverev is one. Thank you.

Scoville (50:14.789)
He's one exactly. can, you can go on this ranking, which I went on nonstop all the time and it's very, it was one and it's all the way, it's from one to like 700. Someone like Dominic Koffer out of high school was ranked German national ranking, like 500. He was not very good. I remember Mark Bors played at Tulane was, was one in the country, two street, two, three straight years in college. And obviously a very good profession. And I remember Mark Bors telling me like, I went over to Germany. I wasn't recruiting him in this.

Torrey Hawkins (50:22.679)
Right. Right.

Alvin Owusu (50:31.668)
We played at Baylor, right? Is that right? Too late, too late, the other one, the green one.

Torrey Hawkins (50:31.703)
Mmm.

Torrey Hawkins (50:38.472)
Any

Scoville (50:44.485)
guy I was with, was just like, take a look at this guy. And he was like 300, 400 in Germany. And I just remember he's like, I just remember he was really competitive. He had good pedigree and he was a good student. I was like, sure, why not take him? And he was four or 500 in Germany, not very good. That's a, at that time, a school like Tulane still when Boris was probably getting them going. Now he probably did not give him much scholarship being four or 500 that low.

Torrey Hawkins (51:03.127)
Mmm.

Scoville (51:14.381)
German but if you give me that scholarship, you're taking a big risk because he has shown very much in his country I got

Torrey Hawkins (51:14.507)
Right.

Torrey Hawkins (51:19.041)
Yeah.

Right. But the point you're making, he was that good and didn't eat ITFs.

Scoville (51:26.647)
He didn't. A guy like Janik Hoffman. I think he's still playing now. Played at USC four years. He came into school, I think 20 or 15 German national ranking, not many ITFs either. And when you come, when your German national ranking is that high, it really shows like, okay, can, someone like Tobias Clemens and Hoffman, they came in and did extremely well in college tennis. That's no surprise by how what their ranking was in Germany.

Alvin Owusu (51:31.25)
USC, yeah.

Torrey Hawkins (51:35.543)
Right.

Scoville (51:56.662)
You know, they established as being one of the best juniors in Germany, not really leaving the country to play other tournaments. You the competition, same in France.

Torrey Hawkins (52:00.917)
Right.

Torrey Hawkins (52:05.429)
I know Francis system. got that system where you're basically playing every week and depending on your minus 1.5 or minus 10.5, they basically seed you kind of block seeding into the next week and you're basically playing if you think about it, it's almost a UTR level never ending tournament that just keeps you playing and your wins get you to the next level and your losses.

Alvin Owusu (52:23.293)
A never ending tournament.

Torrey Hawkins (52:30.325)
kick you back to the level you should be at, but it never ends. wouldn't, it's go about 40 straight weeks, give or take, off and on.

Scoville (52:36.834)
I recruited two players. I helped recruit two players at Oklahoma State from France who did not play much of maybe three or four ITFs, only French. they're, but how the ranking goes there, if you're a minus 15, that means you're gonna probably be an All-American. You're gonna probably have a great chance of being an All-American in college. You're pretty legit. Minus four six means like you can play division one, any probably top 20 level. Minus two six is you gotta see how you play.

We don't know their end in a zero is, I don't know. So these kids were coming in that Oklahoma state minus four six. And I watched one of them play in France and didn't play any ITFs just played French nationals, men's opens and futures. And that's all he played. And he came into school ready to go because he just played a lot. And keep in mind, he came in school, ready to go.

Torrey Hawkins (53:09.449)
Right, right.

Torrey Hawkins (53:30.527)
Good luck.

Scoville (53:32.702)
The majority of his matches were on clay. I was really actually worried about him coming in January because he only played on clay. But he was just, I remember telling him, just get yourself ready to play fast, play some more as much as you can. And he was, it's just the matches he was playing. He was just ready to play.

Torrey Hawkins (53:37.044)
on hardcore.

Alvin Owusu (53:39.654)
Indoor.

Torrey Hawkins (53:41.437)
Right.

Alvin Owusu (53:52.681)
So let me ask you this, Scott, and taking these, the different examples that you guys have given from the European circuit where these younger players, obviously this is not broken up by age group, right? There's no 12s, 14s, 16s, whatever. If you're 14 and you're really, really good, you're gonna be playing against 26 year olds who are really also probably pretty good as well. Where in the US, our system is, it's age based as you move up, so.

you know, you're five in your age group, you're playing against the same players kind of all the way through until you guys age out of this. But you mentioned that the matches that the players get in Europe are so much, you know, they're getting so many more high level, highly competitive matches so that their ITF ranking is kind of irrelevant.

What can players do in the United States with the given system that we have who have aspirations of like, you know, being highly recruited in college or having aspirations to going pro, what can they do to kind of make up the gap that, you know, isn't really available to them with the standard system that we have of sectionals, nationals, right?

Torrey Hawkins (54:56.209)
Right. There is no national team, national club team here in the States.

Scoville (54:59.134)
Well, I know down here where I live in West Palm Beach at Rick Macy's place, he has a men's open every weekend called Val La Boca. You can win money. think Jensen Brooks would play one weekend. it's, and then now they have these PTTs. These kids can play when you can make money. I think you have to be a certain UTR, but you're guaranteed like a few hundred bucks just to show up. There are different, there are different ways. You just don't have to play.

Alvin Owusu (55:22.387)
Okay.

Scoville (55:27.326)
USTA, you can play some UTR events. I encourage all these kids when in the college. Yes, even the ITA events. I'm like, use the ITA event, there are matches. I don't think these kids don't understand the value of playing matches. Like, it's just, we don't play enough matches here. It's a lot of training and it's a lot of saving ourselves. And then we can, if you want to right now, get into the whole UTR craze.

Torrey Hawkins (55:32.814)
Lot of UTR prize money events going on now.

Scoville (55:57.118)
that we're saving our UTR, if you go on all these national, supernationals back draws, just like kids are flopping nonstop, they don't wanna play back draw anymore to save their UTR, it's a travesty. And I go and watch and I see like one kid I was coaching playing clay courts, he's having a walkover in the back draw every day. Every day someone's pulling out. And we're missing the big point is the matches. Like when Torrey, when I played the third against

Philip K.O. I didn't, I played 3-4. I did not want to play 3-4. I was really upset about losing the day before. I could care less about getting some bronze. And I remember Torrie sat me down and was like, we're going to see how much of a man you are today if you're going to step up and play and not be mad that you lost here. You know, like, you know, I was absolutely right. Like I would eat, if it was my choice, I'd be like, why am I playing this? This makes no sense. I don't want to play. I came here to, what's the point of playing this? It's the matches.

and we're missing those matches.

Torrey Hawkins (57:00.11)
I'm going to add on to that and add one more accolade Alvin. Scope got a wild card into the quali that year. I feel that Philip KO match and Philip is a good player. Put him into a okay. I'm pissed about the tournament, but I finished off well. He qualified and won three matches. One kid was already top hundred ITF. Scope was not very good ITF at that point in time. Hadn't played a lot of ITFs and went on to win two matches in the main as a 15, 16 year old.

at the US Open Junior, we're going to lose to Baghdad. said, was the second round, I thought it was maybe third round score, because you beat a pretty decent seed in that tournament. I wanna say five seed, I wanna see you lost round of 16 to Marcos. Long story, five matches, Alvin, if memory serves, five maybe, Marcos would have been a sixth match at the ITF level, literally two or three weeks later. So I always felt that that Philip K.O. match kind of let him know.

That semi with Baheed was a little tough. Hey, let's get over it. He went on. I don't think I think he won 10 matches that month at a high level. And that to me was a real big breakout period for Sco during that time frame. And Sco to your point, I feel like the UTR and our whole system inflates players rankings. I want to get your thoughts on it. Because what we don't get at the high level for our American juniors

there's no pressure on your ranking coming down. If I, let's just say for ranking purposes, right? Let's say, Sco, you're a 14, Alvin's a 12, I'm a 10, okay? There is no pressure on you, Sco, from the 16s and 15s down, because you're in this little bubble of American junior tennis. If you only play up, you're only gonna become a 15, right? You never played me, you never played Alvin, you only play in college players, you can only become a 15.

Scoville (58:48.089)
Mm-hmm.

Torrey Hawkins (58:56.384)
Whereas the European system, you're pitted against the 12s and the 15s, so to speak. So there's always a way to, in my opinion, to prove that you are a 14. And to me, the top juniors, the reason why I don't see them always have the top level ITF results is because the UTR is a bit inflated. I wanna get your thoughts on that.

Scoville (59:20.087)
You know, I remember, you really being big on not skipping steps. Like I was begging you, like when I was 16, like I'm done playing 16s. I want to play 18s. want to play, I want to play ITFs. I want to play 18s. I want to play 16s. And you were like, you haven't won a super national or 16s national. Not even a super national, a 16s national. Until you can show me you can win a 16s national. And that was at the time I was changing my forehand. And it was like, I remember I'm like,

I have this amount of time. got to win a tournament now so I can get out of these 16s. I remember thinking that. And it was always like, you got to do this before you can get here. Like all these tournaments, like Junior Wimbledon or Junior US Open, Torrey would be more upset at me that once again, at Macon you're finishing fourth. Now you go and play this tournament, but you're not even the best in your state. Kenny Thorne had a Georgia Tech men's open every year. Torrey was really big on me winning that tournament.

yes.

Alvin Owusu (01:00:18.056)
That one was no joke. Like I remember that tournament was no joke. The holiday tournament, yep.

Scoville (01:00:23.082)
some of the best, some of the best in not even the city. Michael Yanni at Duke was coming to play that. I remember I lost the...

Torrey Hawkins (01:00:27.145)
Pros, pros, yeah, pros are playing it. Top college players are playing it. Former tech alum came through and shot to play the Dubs. It was big time.

Scoville (01:00:39.54)
So those were like, it wasn't like where the goal was these big tournaments here is like, dude, you're not even the man in your own city. Like win these tournaments like that holiday tournament. I remember when I won it, that was a hard time winning that tournament. I think I played for Vahaly in the tournament actually. And I remember like that was hard when that tournament that week of just like I had to give it was like playing a pro level event. And

Torrey Hawkins (01:00:57.053)
Yeah, yeah.

Torrey Hawkins (01:01:07.017)
That's...

Scoville (01:01:08.979)
Those are how you get better. Those matches like that. Because I'm not going to that match like, this will help my UTR, this will help my ranking. If I win this, this will go up. If I lose this, it'll go there. Like I'm playing some of the last year I played the Georgia Tech tournament, that holiday invite was, every match I lost was gonna, if every match I played, I'm expected to win. So if I lose anything, it's terrible.

Torrey Hawkins (01:01:33.353)
Yeah. Yeah.

Scoville (01:01:36.276)
You know, so that pressure as well, these kids don't know how to play with pressure. They don't know how to play with being the man. You know, like it's harder to be the man, to be hunted You know, like a lot of kids don't. And I see that with kids like, I would see a lot of kids when I was recruiting Americans and I'd be talking to them on the phone. All right, when's the beginning of tournament? Are you going to be playing Kalamazoo? And they're like, no, I'm playing.

this ITF, that ITF, this ITF, that ITF. And I'm just thinking, why you just dodge the competition? There's no way you should be not playing Kalamazoo This is the biggest tournament for any 16, 18 year old junior in this country. You know, like there's no excuse not to play this tournament. None, no excuse.

Torrey Hawkins (01:02:07.761)
Yeah, the Dodge and straw.

Alvin Owusu (01:02:26.846)
So that's an interesting one and we're coming up on time here and I feel like we're gonna have to get back into this conversation or a different flavor of this conversation. There's so much, I've got so many notes written down here and so many really, really interesting things that you've touched on, Sco, that I feel could be their own episodes in themselves and probably will be in the future, assuming you wanna come back and hang out with us again. But.

Scoville (01:02:51.778)
Ha

Alvin Owusu (01:02:52.359)
There's a little thing I usually hit T.H. with at the end of each one of these episodes is, I like to call it Coach's Corner. And so as the guest, I'm gonna take a trip to Coach's Corner with you and I'm gonna ask a very poignant but broad question and maybe both of you guys can chip in here. Let's say we go back to 16 year old Scoville Jenkins, right? But Scoville Jenkins is 16 in the year 2025.

how would each of you as coaches approach the next 12 months for that particular player? That high level, top in the section, at that point you're probably top 20ish, 25 in the country, like you're making the, you're like, okay, I'm going for this thing. How would you handle that player's next 12 months?

Scoville (01:03:52.434)
That's a great question actually in this year. Yeah.

Alvin Owusu (01:03:55.39)
That's what I that's my job here.

Scoville (01:03:59.388)
Great question.

Torrey Hawkins (01:04:02.041)
You want me to go first?

Scoville (01:04:04.038)
You go first, Tor. Yeah.

Torrey Hawkins (01:04:05.593)
Here's what I would do.

This is a funny story and it'll segue. There was a time, Alvin, when Scobar signed with Octagon that they were talking. At the time, Juan Jose Yugaras was signed on with Octagon and there was a handful of American players, Scobar was one, and they had three or four other European players. think Monfils was in that same conversation, Andy Murray and so on, that they wanted him to become the coach of this little group and they were going to be.

coaching, he was going to coaching them, taking them on the tour, playing some ITFs, playing some pro events, of course, and all that. Obviously, send them home, almost their own little, if you will, USTA, their own little octagon travel team, so to speak. At 16 in 2025, having Jose Hugueras of that caliber now in 2025, I would have done everything in my power to put the 16 year old Sco with that group.

and hope they based out of Spain, hope they based out of France, based out of wherever to Scho's point in this discussion to put them around that level of competition and that level of teammates to where they would grind and work for the next 18 months. And I think Scho in particular and the rest of the group in particular would have all made not just made top hundred, but they the group of them would have been

probably top 20 to top 50 with a few of them having some chances to be with and with the current group top 10 for sure with the group that he played back in those days with the goats that we've had who just retired and who are kind of approaching that retirement. I'm saying top 50 so they would have been top 10. Maybe if you haven't even had a chance to be top five and winning a slam. That's what I would have done because I look back and say to school's point the matches the quality matches having that next, you know, it's go you spoke to it.

Torrey Hawkins (01:06:01.73)
You were introduced to a new level of player, a new level, a new intensity, a new team, a new level of competition. Continue that. I always felt we never had that true level when you came back home. And so to me, that's what I would change as a coach was to reinvent that next level for him with those group of players, that level of coach, and be able to have the country, the system, the pro tournaments, the club level be able to be that backdrop.

That's one of my answers.

Alvin Owusu (01:06:31.998)
So Torrey, let me double down on that then. You said, you Sco never had that level when he came back home. How would you, you were his coach, how would you change that today? Same situation, Sco comes back home between events. How do you recreate that intense, that small, you know, intense training group with what you've got or where you are geographically?

Torrey Hawkins (01:06:38.124)
Right?

Torrey Hawkins (01:06:52.747)
It's a great question. I would have had to become an assistant coach at Tech or at Georgia to get that level of players. I think what Brian Shelton did at Florida was indirectly and directly affected Ben phenomenally because he had those level players in his back pocket. again, I'm not... Junior players playing up. was a pretty good junior player that became a top junior player.

Alvin Owusu (01:07:11.934)
Junior players playing with college players.

Torrey Hawkins (01:07:19.072)
hitting him with Dad's college players at UF and Gainesville. And I thought about that, by the way, as something I was willing to do. It was just something that I looked back on it and those are one of the things I said, I should have done that because that would have gave him the level of those type of players to play against. So that's to me is the only way to create it nowadays or, and school you remember this, Judy Murray took Andy away from LTA and took him to Spain.

Alvin Owusu (01:07:21.512)
Gotcha.

Torrey Hawkins (01:07:47.742)
to train on the clay with those players and train over there with those guys and rip balls. Took him out of the system where he was one of the better ones and said, hey, put him with the pros. So I don't to get this guy's answer, but that's what I would have done is to take, recreate that pod, if you will, recreate that group, almost the next academy, his true next level, and then give those guys, get all of them, but obviously score in particular, give them the best shot to see what they can do.

Scoville (01:07:48.043)
Yeah.

Alvin Owusu (01:07:58.579)
Yeah.

Scoville (01:08:14.911)
You know, I kind of agree with Torrey here and it's just kind of putting yourself around that like I really needed someone to show me what it was to be a professional and not a professional tennis player, professional athlete. And that's how you conduct yourself working out, recovering every even like how to take care of your mental.

You know, to make sure you're not crashing out and you're going 10 to 10 to 10 is too much here. But being around, you know, people just to like, especially professionals. I remember after, after I played Andy Roddick at US Open, I went to his house for about a week. And then I went to Davis Cup hitting partner with him for about a week. So I was with him for about two weeks. And I got really lucky when I was there, Mike and Bob Bryan showed up, Marty Fish showed up. So the practices were like really, really.

intense man. We're doing two and one to the Bryan Brothers. And I'm literally I remember playing with Andy two and ones and I'm like, I'm not playing that bad. He's blaming me for everything, you know, and then they were like, dude, we just don't miss volleys. You know, like I remember I'm just like, I'm just like, it's just a level. And I remember just every day just catching on a little bit more, catching on a little bit more, catching on a little bit more. And there was just nothing. I wish I would have picked on this earlier. There was nothing like

Alvin Owusu (01:09:17.264)
Heh. Heh. Heh.

Scoville (01:09:36.187)
Spectaculate like spectacular they did as far. I Andy had humongous sir big forehand just ridiculous game, but but it was it was it was that But the really thing that these guys really did was and all these great players do is they able to lock in like when he gets tough they trusted themselves the most and a lot of times I was fault or with my confidence of

Trusting myself all the way and I noticed these players they trust themselves in the most crucial time and If it doesn't happen, oh well, give me another shot here like it didn't matter that was really a thing I saw playing futures in the beginning where these guys were one season the tournaments and they're losing first round or a bad match and rarely did sometimes I mean a lot of times you see people getting upset but a lot of times I'll see these guys just like take it on the chin

come back the next day and get ready for the next one. You I really watched that and how, you know, you're playing so many weeks and it really helps when you can be around somebody that's doing it or has done it. Look at Zverev, he had an older brother that he watched his whole life, played juniors and pro, helped him a ton. He saw that level as a young kid. Alcares, his father played a little professional tennis, owned a tennis club, you know.

Torrey Hawkins (01:10:50.683)
Yep. Yep.

Scoville (01:11:00.711)
And that connection probably got him with what Juan calls Ferraro. know, the same with Nadal, getting that connection there. that helps. And that goes back to your country as well, where you're from. You know, like in France, I remember, I was in Paris a few years ago at French Open and I forget his name. He grew up playing with the Gael and Juniors.

Torrey Hawkins (01:11:04.389)
Yep. Moi and the doll, for sure.

Scoville (01:11:29.092)
And he said, when you got really good in the French system, had two places you went. You either went up north or you went to Paris. He goes, they sent me and Gael to up north. And he goes, up north, they were pretty mean to us. And it was really kind of ruthless, little bullying. He goes, and I took it as disrespect and was fighting. But Gael, he used all that anger and took it on the tennis court. It was like, I'm going to beat your ass on the court. And you can see when he plays.

You know, just like he just learned how to harness that with all of this great competition. You know, if like, all right, I can handle all this. I'm going to use this and I'm going to use this energy to whoop your ass on the tennis court right now.

Alvin Owusu (01:12:13.534)
You know, it's the combination of what you guys have both mentioned kind of the first thing I started to think of is like, this is like late 80s, early 90s, voluntary style environment, which it looks like we've kind of gotten away from that here in the States, or maybe we haven't, and I think that's another episode, but those are.

Torrey Hawkins (01:12:35.169)
we have. We 1000 % have. And that should be another episode. I think to your point, I don't want to take your thought away because that was when it was pure. That was when development and you get to that to the next level, which of course is the pro level and the top 100 top 50 top 10 pro level was the most important thing. Can you hang or not? And

Are you contributing to the practice because that current top 10 who's on the other side of the net is going to demand it from you. And I think we've unfortunately gotten away from that. feel like I feel like coaches don't are bleeding for it as much. could I could build another episode will go into the wise, but that's that's reality. It's not happening. And I feel like. It's something that's not happening to the detriment of our players and not to mention the current culture, Dodging, you mentioned it's go.

The culture in 2000s was much hungrier than the culture, in my opinion, of juniors in 2020, in the 2020s. And I feel like you've missed the voluntary when he was there, bankrupt and all. IMG's still there, it's making a ton of money now. But I don't know if they're cranking out the players, if they ever will, that they had back in the 80s, 90s, early 2000s. mean, that was a time when, man, tennis was at its top, in my opinion, in the States.

And I do that scope. Join us for the next episode. I want to talk about what you've seen both as an associate head coach, top junior, a pro player about the American tennis kind of the journey, what you would change, what you would keep, what are other countries doing better than we are. And we might just have to touch on that on the current USDA direction a little bit without getting too deep and getting too much in the weeds.

So if you would join us on one more episode, we can get into this a little bit further. And Alvin, as always, appreciate you moderating and keeping us on track as best we can.

Alvin Owusu (01:14:39.568)
Absolutely, absolutely. Torrey, thank you for joining me once again. Scoville, this was fun. have a, anytime, I'm gonna hold you to that. I'm gonna hold you to that. All right.

Scoville (01:14:46.514)
Anytime, anytime guys.

Torrey Hawkins (01:14:50.231)
Absolutely. I want to see though, I want to see a Travis Owusu Scoville Jenkins rematch at 25 years later. That's my, that's my, I want to just see the tie break. Travis can't play like that.

Alvin Owusu (01:15:00.146)
Hahahaha

Scoville (01:15:00.962)
You know, Travis owned me in juniors. was, you know, I got a funny, before we live, I got a hilarious Travis story that happened to me when I was a junior. I was telling my wife this before. I think we're playing, I forget we were playing. We're like 11, 12 years old. And Travis and I had some knockdown drag out matches. And they were push fast for sure, but they were long push fast. And Travis would do anything to when he was loud, he was dramatic.

Torrey Hawkins (01:15:10.433)
Okay.

Torrey Hawkins (01:15:20.884)
Yep.

Alvin Owusu (01:15:23.793)
You

Scoville (01:15:29.266)
I was too like, we did not want to lose to each other. So we're getting we're waiting, we're waiting for each other. We're waiting to play. And he's like walking back and forth, like next to me, like walking back and forth looking at me. And then he just walks by and says, I'm gonna beat your ass today right in front of my dad. Right. And it like shocked shocked me.

Torrey Hawkins (01:15:29.928)
Ha

Alvin Owusu (01:15:49.583)
Hahaha!

Scoville (01:15:54.452)
It shot me, me out of my game. Travis beat the crap out of me that match. It took me out of my game. Because I just could not believe he just said that.

Alvin Owusu (01:16:04.117)
That's hilarious.

Torrey Hawkins (01:16:04.685)
my God.

Scoville (01:16:05.588)
Travis, he took me out of my game. was already like, mean, Travis and I used to play something ridiculous. Like we were young, so they were push fast, but they would just be, whoever lost the point was rolling on the floor in tears. You know, it took forever to get back. You have our parents like, come on, mean, parents are on the side. If you keep acting like this one more time, I'm taking you off the court. know, like it was, it's during those times.

Torrey Hawkins (01:16:08.98)
You

Torrey Hawkins (01:16:15.102)
Yeah.

Torrey Hawkins (01:16:18.964)
Right, right.

Torrey Hawkins (01:16:32.846)
Alvin Owusu (01:16:33.022)
You know, that's a hilarious story. you know, my brother, I don't think we've talked about him on this show, but his brushes with greatness. Obviously, you go on to do great things in tennis. He was also a middle school teammate with Jody Meeks, who played in the NBA, and Josh Smith, who played in the NBA, and Dexter Fowler, also rookie of the year in MLB, Jordan brand athlete, you know.

Torrey Hawkins (01:16:52.312)
well, Yeah.

Scoville (01:16:55.187)
Gotcha.

Alvin Owusu (01:17:02.334)
three time All-Star World Series champion, that whole deal, but he was the same with all of them at that age, exactly the same.

Torrey Hawkins (01:17:07.75)
Right, right. And talked as much trash to all of them, I'm sure. Yeah. And I bet each of them has a similar story in the other sports. I promise you. That was Travis. Miss Travis. Shout out to Travis, man. Shout out to Travis Owusu

Alvin Owusu (01:17:12.443)
yeah, yeah, yeah.

You

Scoville (01:17:21.447)
Yeah, that was Travis. That was tra-

I'd have to try it.

Alvin Owusu (01:17:26.396)
What we'll get him. He's always around. We'll get them on the episode one day. but again, thank you. Thank, thank you both again, you guys for joining us tonight. another, another one under the lights and, we'll get back at it soon.

Torrey Hawkins (01:17:33.967)
Absolutely.

Torrey Hawkins (01:17:37.976)
Absolutely, Alvin. Thank you, Sco. Good catching up, brother. We'll talk soon.

Scoville (01:17:41.663)
Alright.

Alvin Owusu (01:17:42.869)
All right, later guys.

Torrey Hawkins (01:17:43.292)
Peace.