Otahks in need of break

Forget sun and sand. Spring break for the Southeast Missouri State University women's team is all about serve and volley.

The Otahkians rolled out of town Sunday morning, headed south in search of some victories. Following them on the road trip is the baggage of an 0-10 record.

"We're either going to bond," said first-year coach Jay Pacelli, "or we're going to strangle each other after five or six days on the road."

He's betting on the former. Misery loves company; people who need people, etc.

"I expected a lot of growing pains," said Pacelli, who took over the program near the end of September. "The team has been bonding and pulling for one another.

"We have five young players who have never played college tennis before. We've had some stretches of fine play that haven't shown up in the box score and the overall score. The overall effort and the enthusiasm is still there."

Pacelli hopes this is the week when effort and enthusiasm equal wins.

A struggling program

But the coach knew what he was getting into when he took the position. Southeast tennis has not exactly been an Ohio Valley Conference contender in recent years. The Otahkians were 20-75 in six seasons prior to this one and frequently hovered near the OVC cellar.

Whatever progress they made last year, finishing seventh of nine teams in the conference and improving on 2002's 2-17 campaign, has been washed away like a sand castle on a beach. Pacelli is the program's third coach in three years. The lineup he's putting out on the court looks nothing like last year's lineup. Three seniors graduated. The top returning player, Daniela Garcia of Peru, had surgery on her shoulder in the offseason and may not play this year.

Senior Kay Ehlke has occupied the No. 1 singles slot often this season after playing No. 3 or No. 4 last year. Two sophomore and three freshmen round out the team.

Six times the Otahkians have lost 7-0, and twice they have lost matches 6-1 with their only points coming via forfeits.

"You can either learn or get better, or you can cash in your chips," Pacelli said. "This team is not ready to cash in its chips, and that's encouraging to see as a coach."

When Pacelli took the team on its first road venture, back in October, he had only four players to enter in a tournament in Memphis.

Prior to the start of the spring season, he grabbed Jackson graduates Kimmy Anderson and Kelly Mitchell to make up two-thirds of his first recruiting class.

"Those two have certainly helped," Pacelli said. "If those two weren't playing, it wouldn't look very pretty. I thought the addition of Kimmy and Kelly would help us be competitive and get us through the year.

"I could have looked at some junior college players but I want to look ahead for next year. I want to use our scholarship funds to bring in the best possible players. That's hard to do with a month, a month-and-a-half in the fall."

The presence of Anderson and Mitchell will help the program establish a local profile, and it shows that Pacelli is willing to add local contributors to turn around the program.

"You can't field a team with all local talent and be competitive in the NCAA Division I level," he said, "but you can find players who can contribute and be a part of the nucleus of the team. I think, with the current situation, you look for good players no matter where they are from. My recruiting effort will be to find players who live two hours, two days or half a world away.

"I think there's a great opportunity here. With some strong recruiting efforts, I think we'll be a much-improved team. In two or three years, we want to have a team that will compete with the top of the OVC.

"Things can turn around quick."

Quick may even mean this week. The Otahkians played Troy State on Monday. They take on Spring Hill, an NAIA team, on Wednesday. They face OVC foe Jacksonville State on Thursday. They close the trip by facing another struggling program, OVC member Tennessee State, on Friday.

"We're going to be in some matches in the very near future," Pacelli said. "You go out there to have positive outcomes and success. We wouldn't be going if we didn't think that was possible."

The Otahkians return home Monday (March 22) with a match against Northwest Missouri State. Their only other remaining home match is April 4 against Eastern Illinois.

"One thing I do promise is maximum effort," Pacelli said. "We scheduled 22 matches and we're going to play all 22 matches hard and we're going to see some remarkable improvement by the end of the season.

"There's only one way to go after an 0-10 start."