by Caroline Domecq
LSU Sports Information
Amanda Mang finds herself in a different situation this year for the LSU women’s tennis team. She is the lone senior on the Lady Tigers’ squad.
“Last year we had the same exact team as the year before, and we all had kind of the same leadership roles,” Mang said. “But now we have three new freshmen on the team, and I do feel I have to be more of a leader.”
In her first three-plus seasons at LSU, including this fall, Mang boasts a 53-46 singles record, including a 12-7 mark in Southeastern Conference dual matches. But those numbers do not accurately reflect all of her capabilities.
In each of the last two years, she suffered injuries at key times in the season and was forced to miss many of the team’s conference matches.
“Everybody has injuries; that’s just part of playing sports,” she explained. “It’s just that mine were at really bad timings. It’s hard training for something so long, and then right when it counts getting injured.”
Even tougher than suffering the injuries, according to Mang, are coming back from them both physically and mentally.
“It’s hard work coming back from any injury,” she said. “It’s tough just getting back your strength and timing. And it’s hard getting back mentally on top of that.”
Head coach Tony Minnis realizes how inopportune Mang’s injuries have been and said an entire year of staying healthy could really show her true abilities.
“It’s really been unfortunate for her that in late February the last couple of years she’s gotten hurt, really slowing down her opportunity to improve,” Minnis said. “But if we can keep her healthy with the way she is competing now, she’s as good as I’ve seen her.”
If her freshman year, the only season she stayed healthy throughout, is any indication, Mang could get some impressive wins. She finished that year as the Lady Tigers’ winningest singles player with 23 victories and led the team in the SEC with a 7-4 mark.
And being on the top of her game is nothing new for Mang. A New Orleans native, she earned a number of accolades as the star for the Mount Carmel Academy tennis team.
Her team won the state title her sophomore and senior years of high school, and she was the individual state champion both her junior and senior years. But according to Mang, that success does not mean as much to her as achieving excellence as part of a team at the collegiate level.
“It means a lot more now,” she said of her achievements at LSU. “It’s a lot more of a team effort. I didn’t even really practice with the team in high school. But here we practice together, work out together and see each other every day. We know we all have the same goal and wanting to achieve it all together is a lot different.”
One goal the team set and was able to achieve last year was winning the SEC West. With the SEC being arguably the most dominant conference in collegiate tennis, that was a big accomplishment for the Lady Tigers, and so much so for Mang that she lists it as her favorite moment in her LSU career.
“That was awesome, because we had the same team as two years ago and that year we didn’t do as well as we should have,” she said. “We weren’t really that close of a team. And then after another year with the same people all having the same goals and working together, doing the extra stuff and pushing each other for the whole year, it all came together.”
Coming from a family of athletes, going that extra mile is something stressed to both she and her sister often. Amanda and her sister Melissa, a senior in high school, both had the opportunity to play tennis professionally after high school. However, Amanda chose to come to LSU, and Melissa just signed with Duke and will play tennis there starting next fall.
A big reason for all of their accomplishments, Mang cited, is their father. In his day, Fabien Mang played baseball for the Atlanta Braves organization. He understands what it takes to play at the elite level and the importance of doing the little things to get there.
“He pushes us really hard,” she said of her father. “I don’t always like it, but in the end it helps to have someone always push you. He’s been through everything and he understands how you need to work on weaknesses even though you don’t want to.
“He got injured–that’s what made him stop playing–so he also knows a lot about rehab and injuries and how important it is to take care of yourself off the court.”
Mang has trained vigorously this offseason, really hoping to stay healthy and be a major contributor to the team her senior year. Her team is really important to her, and that aspect of being a team player is something Mang said she really loves about the college game.
“When I was a sophomore, we had a really good team, but we didn’t really achieve any goals that we had set,” she explained. “We were more of individuals than a team. Everybody had good games, but we would win on different days, work hard on different days.
“Then the same team the next year became an actual team. We all fought hard on the same day, and if one of us were having trouble, the other ones would come through. That season taught me so much about being part of a team and learning how to deal with others and doing things for others at times.”
She will look to pick up some key wins against tough non-conference and conference opponents on the Lady Tigers’ schedule, a schedule that includes 13 opponents that finished in the top 50 last season.
She knows she is capable of those big victories and also holds the utmost confidence in her team.
“I think this team can do anything,” she said. “We have a lot of great players returning and then we have three really good freshmen. Our depth is really good, and we just need to fight as hard as we can and pull out the tough matches ahead.”