1-on-1 with DP – 93.7 The Ticket KNTK - Nebraska Tennis season so far, going forward in 2026: March 10th, 2026, 9:35am

Episode Date: March 10, 2026

Cornhuskers' campaign so far, what's coming up with conference play on the horizon. Advertising Inquiries: https://redcircle.com/brandsPrivacy & Opt-Out: https://redcircle.com/privacy

sponsored by the downtown Lincoln Foundation on 93-7 the ticket. Welcome back. It is, it is Tuesday, right? That's correct. Yeah, I'm out of the loop. I'll get, I'll get focused and reconnected. We were just talking during the break about officiating, and I found that I, there were things, again, I'm constantly learning. Coach, you just described, you just gave a definition, description.

description of how officials are found for tennis at Nebraska and the Big Ten. Share with the listener where officials are found and where they come from and who sanctions them. Yeah, well, it kind of depends on where you are in the states. There's some areas of the states that have, you know, more officials to pull from, but a lot of them are pretty regional or local, you know, coming from the Nebraska area or the area or the air. areas surrounding, whether it be Iowa or Missouri or Kansas, every now and then we'll have to fly one in from further away if we can't find six or seven officials that can all work at the same time.

So it's a battle, and we work closely with our regional chair on finding officials. But there's a couple of them from right here in Lincoln that'll do a handful of our matches and then there's other times where we have, you know, a whole new, a whole new staff. During the Big Ten season, the Big Ten takes care of all that and they're the ones that hire everyone. So it's not really up to us anymore. But for the out of conference schedule, it's kind of on me and that person to kind of piece together the officials to make sure that we have enough for the matches coming up. Yeah, I would imagine, and I would just imagine it's the same

for high school tennis here. Yeah, I don't honestly don't know. I think the NSA, they have their way of doing it. I think the officials, I would assume, are all from Nebraska for the high school state tournament in high school tennis, but I don't think they're flying anyone in from Virginia to do the tennis here in Nebraska. But I know in college that will happen from time to time. are in high demand every Friday and Sunday every every every university's playing matches and every

every match needs six officials in in the power five at least so um sometimes they're easy to find sometimes they're not just depending on what's going on and then there's also the ATP tour and the WTA tour where officials will go and work those and sometimes our schedules overlap with tournaments that are in the states uh like indian wells this week out in California though you know there's a whole host officials that need to be out there doing that and then next week down in Miami is the same thing. So there's always a push and a pole. And, you know, luckily we have a good base of officials that we can rely on and count on

and can be here and do both the men's and women's matches here in Nebraska. Through all of it, you have, I'll ask it and not infer it. Is there friction, is there ever friction between coaches and officials? Is the sky blue? It's blue today, it looks like. Yeah. Yeah, I mean, it's just, I mean, you name a sport. There's, you know, football, it's like, you know, it just seems like a thing that you do.

You yell at the officials basketball. There's a tip ball. You know, there's just so many variables. It's the least, thank job in sports, I think, is. being an official. I think it's a really tough job to have and to do to want to do. I know you get to be up close in front to some amazing stuff, but when there's a lot of these decisions are made in a blink of an eye or half a second and you got to make the right decision and just sometimes you don't. And that's kind of how it is in sports. So I don't know what the what the futures. I know in

tennis, I think we're going to have electronic lines line calling here in the future, whether it's the next year or the year after that, I think that's going to be, that's going to happen. I think that's going to alleviate a lot of the problems in college tennis and make the whole mass experience much, much better. And that would absolutely help the issue of coaches and officials arguing. Do they know how that would work? I've seen it volleyball. How would that work with the six tennis court?

Yeah, so there's a, there's, I, I've yet to see it. But some of the universities have it now. They have it for all the, the championships, the national indoors. They'll have it at the Big Ten Championships this year out in Ohio, California. They'll have it at the NCAA tournament. And they set up a device on the court. I think it's on the net, actually. And I don't know how it works exactly, but some kind of Bluetooth thing where it can see the whole court, all the lines.

and the players will still make the call. And if there's a call that they think isn't right, they'll challenge the call with the official. And the official has like an iPad and they'll click the button and it'll tell it if it's in or out. So I think then at least you have a third party that everyone can be like, hey, like it's probably not 100% perfect, probably 90, 95% there.

But at least it's a non-biased, thing. The biased part. The biased part. A non-biased thing that can give you a good, accurate, accurate call. Man, that everyone can be happy with. It is crazy. So we're in March, and I'm going to ask you from the coaches standpoint, to go into some of the other sports vacuums to maybe help the way we process and think about this thing. That March Madness and basketball football is about tournament play, right? Finalizing your season, figuring out who, as you said, figuring out who you are as a team and as a program, and then managing the moments within the tournament play. Do you land on be who you are all the time, or do you ever get into manage the situation? manage the situation.

So there are folks that would say, this is what we normally do. But in a tournament where there's finality, right? And one point could determine whether your season extends or doesn't extend. Do you stay within your coaching self and your athletic self, or do you play to the moment? Yeah, I think you have to start with a process. and an identity and who you are as a, for one, as a coach,

and then also as a program. And I think those are your fundamentals that you never go away from ever. And then I think, yeah, it's really hard to separate each game and each play and things like that. But you have to try to, you have to try to create each, to give the same value to each match and to each point and to each player. So when those big moments do show up, I feel like you're more prepared. I think if you play the game like, hey, this is a huge match.

Sometimes you get too hyped up for it or you're, there's a whole host of things that can happen. So I think if you can just treat each match the same way, at the end of the day, it's a game and you still have to go out there and hit the ball between the lines and you hit it over the net and compete. You got to be the hardest competing guy out there. So, you know, for me, it's all about the process and, you know, the things that you you do well and do better than other teams.

But, yeah, I mean, if you're playing for a big time, you know, a Big Ten championship, or if you're in a position to have a huge win, like those thoughts always creep in your head. And then it's how well can you handle those moments. And I think it all comes back to how you train and how you prepare and how you tackle each day as a program. Is there a common, so Nebraska basketball is working in this thing

that they had struggles, they had the great start to the season, then you had that meat grinder gauntlet that they went through where things got tough. And then you figure out a way to beat Iowa, which in any Nebraska sport is a highlight to the season, but it also sends you into the postseason. At your highest point almost, I would imagine being number two, walking into the Big Ten tournament, how do you handle that?

So let's say end of tennis season, for some reason, for whatever circumstances, you're the number two seed going to the Big Ten front. What does that say? What do you use that for? Is that a cautionary tale? Is that a celebration? Are you talking about the two seed? Are you really just eliminating that and talking about what you want the players to think about?

Well, I think Fred's probably happy. They get an extra day off, I think. So that's probably the most important. thing going on in the basketball world right now is, hey, we get an extra day off, we get an extra buy, we get to kind of watch a little bit some of these games, see some films, see if they've made the adjustments. It also gives you a look internally and say, hey, like, do we need to get a couple of these guys some more rest, or do we need to add maybe a little wrinkle to one play? Do we need to add in? We have time now where maybe we can add something. I don't know exactly

how much time they have. I would assume it starts tomorrow, the Big Ten tournament starts. today, right, the lower seeds today and then. So, yeah, you don't have a whole lot of time. So that extra day off is huge. And then, you know, the team that they started with, you know, at the beginning of the seasons, it's just a whole, you know, it's the same guys, but it's a whole different team, different energy. Everyone has a real good feel for what everyone's doing, not just in their locker room,

but all the teams really know everyone pretty well at this point. So playing a team a second time or a third time, you know, is really tough. Everyone's going to know everyone really well. There's not going to be really too many surprises and it's going to come down to execution and toughness. And, you know, I think I saw a quote that says, yeah, it usually comes down the toughness, rebounding and defense from coach Hoyberg there that I would assume for me that translates a lot to tennis and probably translate a lot to a lot of other sports, you know,

the things that you can control well, you know, are always going to be in favor of you doing well, especially if the offense isn't clicking. So I don't know. I would love to dive deeper into basketball. Basketball is one of the sports that I love, and I played all the way through high school. And it's great to see Fred and the guys doing really well this year. You know, there's not a harder working guy than Coach Hoyberg and his staff. And to see the fruits of the fruits of their labor come to come to the top of the, you know, the cutting board here. This year has been pretty cool to see. Yeah, I mean, it's that part that I think peeking behind the curtain.

As a coach, I would ask you, when you look at Nebraska basketball and at success, what do you think it comes from? What are the things? What can you see about how business is done, how things are handled that in your mind says, That's some really good coach. Yeah, I think it starts with Fred and his vision for what he wants the program to be. And I think they have, you know, they have guys that fit his vision this year really well. You have some really stable, like veteran players, one being his son, that, you know,

I feel like he can really just count on every single game, which I think is, you know, a coach's best friend, is consistency and reliability and knowing what you're going to it allows you to game plan much, you know, with a much finer comb and to do some things from game to game that you wouldn't be able to do if you didn't, if you had a point guard that, you know, turn the ball over three to six times a game. So, you know, it's the exact opposite with Sam. I think it's one, one turnover for every five or six assists. So having a point guard, I think that can really control the flow of the game. And, you know, he's not going to give the, you know, turn it over to the bad guy.

very often allows you to do some things that you normally can't do. So that's my very uneducated guess on to what's going on. Oh, you're bowler. Stop that. I'm not going to pretend to know the ins and outs of college basketball, but I think when you watch them play, if you know sports and you know what good coaching is and they have great players, but they have great coaching.

I think the defensive coach doesn't get as much love is I think he deserves. I think his name's Nate. I think he's. Yeah, unbelievable. I mean, their defense doesn't get talked about enough. I think that's also been, you know, a thing that they've been really building the last couple years.

And now they, I think their defense is something they really hang their head on each and every day when they play. So I think it's just a whole, the whole circle's coming together and you're seeing what Nebraska basketball can really be like. It's an interesting time. in sports because a lot of things are fluid.

Things are changing and the ability to adapt and adjust to your situation is coming into play. Coach, we'll go to break. We'll come back. I want to ask about there's some conversation that I was having with listeners and fans. And they said the difference between getting the experienced players, players who would come to your program, stay in your program, develop in your program, and then succeeding the program versus going and getting more talent and putting them into the program and trying to elevate the program there.

Let's ask you your thoughts. How does that play out in tennis? Is it get old and stay old from within? Or is it putting somebody into the soup that's the missing ingredient? How do you think about it? How does it affect Husker tennis? We'll get that from coach when we come back. Watch live on Facebook, YouTube, or Twitch.

You're listening to One-on-One with DP. 937 the ticket and the ticketfm.com.