As May draws closer, seniors prepare to say their goodbyes and arrange their futures. Intense emotions accompany such occasions, and they can range from the excitement of a new chapter to the sadness of leaving tremendous friendships behind.<\/p>\n
Alejandro Moreno finds himself amid this precise situation.<\/p>\n
The senior, who has called Knoxville home since December 2018 \u2014 with a brief two-season stint at Auburn \u2014 is set to take the court for the last time at Barksdale Tennis Stadium on Sunday versus South Carolina, and he acknowledges feeling \u201ctwo emotions on both ends of the spectrum.\u201d<\/p>\n
\u201cI\u2019m just very excited to start my pro career, but at the same time I\u2019m super sad because I\u2019m leaving my teammates behind, this great program and these great coaches behind,\u201d Moreno said.<\/p>\n
Associate head coach Matt Lucas, whom he has grown quite close to, very much understands what his seniors will be feeling and what such an occasion represents.<\/p>\n
\u201cI remember my senior day at NC State, and it\u2019s a lot of blood, sweat and tears that these guys have put into it, and this is kind of the culmination of all of that,\u201d Lucas said. \u201cIt\u2019s a day that, you know, 20 years later I still remember.\u201d<\/p>\n
While Moreno has spent just two seasons with the program, having transferred in as a junior prior to the 2024-25 season, Lucas said he \u201cembodies\u201d what it means to be a Volunteer.<\/p>\n
\u201cHe busts his tail every day, he doesn\u2019t complain, he loves the university, he loves our athletic department, he loves his teammates, and so that\u2019s kinda what we look for from everyone,\u201d Lucas said.<\/p>\n
Despite the team staring at a last-place finish in the conference, Moreno has maintained his perspective and focused on \u201cthe day-to-day.\u201d<\/p>\n
\u201cI feel like if you get really caught up on results, it can just eat you from the inside, you know?\u201d Moreno said. \u201cIf you\u2019re focusing on results, you know, let\u2019s say you get a good result. Now you\u2019re gonna focus on the next one, and then the next one, the next one. And you\u2019re almost never gonna be happy, you\u2019re never gonna be content, and I don\u2019t think that\u2019s a very healthy way of living, and not even in tennis, in life in general.\u201d<\/p>\n
The senior faced a new challenge this spring, as he was pressed into duty atop the lineup with the graduation of top players like Shunsuke Mitsui and Alex Kotzen at last season\u2019s end, and such responsibilities come with their own set of pressures.<\/p>\n
\u201cIt\u2019s a lot more stressful up there,\u201d Lucas said. \u201cYou don\u2019t get time off, right? You can\u2019t have mental lapses playing at line one or line two with the schedule that we play, conference and non-conference. I think that was an adjustment phase for him. I think there\u2019s plenty of matches this year he\u2019s been in really good positions to win, and maybe a slight loss of focus for a game or two, and then all of a sudden, the match turns.\u201d<\/p>\n
Moreno faced this harsh reality on the road versus Arkansas. One moment, he had the entire match on his racket. Next, he and the team took a \u201cbrutal loss.\u201d<\/p>\n
\u201cThat one was brutal because, obviously, you have a match point and you want to win for yourself, but at the same time, you also want to win for the team,\u201d Moreno said. \u201cSo it\u2019s almost like a double whammy.\u201d<\/p>\n
While the results haven\u2019t come for the senior \u2014 he sits at 0-4 in conference play \u2014 he has kept fighting.<\/p>\n
\u201cIt would have been very easy after he lost a lot of leads, kinda early part of the SEC season to the middle part of the SEC season to kinda pack it in, but he hasn\u2019t done that, and he\u2019s played really well lately,\u201d Lucas said.<\/p>\n
\u201cIf you\u2019re a Tennessee Vol, no matter what your level is, or if you\u2019re a student athlete, or not, it just means you gotta give your all in whatever you do,\u201d Moreno said.<\/p>\n
Part of his positive attitude this season stems from the culture of the team and his own personality.<\/p>\n
\u201cWhen we\u2019re together, we\u2019re always messing around with each other, crack jokes, trying to get each other to laugh,\u201d Moreno said. \u201cIf we had a camera following us around, and we could stream it on a platform where you can use some words that you\u2019re not allowed to use on an interview or you\u2019re in a classroom, and those types of environments, I think we\u2019d go viral, honestly.\u201d<\/p>\n
Such a lax nature hasn\u2019t always been present this season. While Lucas said he\u2019s easy to \u201cpoke and prod and mess around with,\u201d he also said Moreno put pressure on himself \u201cto be that stalwart number one.\u201d<\/p>\n
\u201cI think he put some expectations on himself, especially after he beat Wake\u2019s number one early in the year,\u201d Lucas said. \u201cI think he\u2019s back to who he was, and it\u2019s just nice to see that, and hopefully he can go out on a high note on Sunday.\u201d<\/p>\n
As the sun sets on Moreno\u2019s career, he will depart the program a \u201cbetter player,\u201d and a \u201cbetter human being,\u201d Lucas said.<\/p>\n
\u201cI think he\u2019s grown up a lot, starting to become a young man,\u201d Lucas said.<\/p>\n
Much of this growth stems from the bond he has cultivated with coach Lucas, who joined Tennessee in his current capacity shortly after Moreno came home.<\/p>\n
\u201cWe have a tremendous relationship,\u201d Lucas said. \u201cIt\u2019s more like big brother, little brother sometimes. Big brother always wins.\u201d<\/p>\n
When he arrived from Auburn, Moreno said he was going through a \u201crough time.\u201d But the coaches invested into him, not just as a player, but as a person from day one, he said. The result? He achieved a career-best ranking of 56 back in February, and he said he\u2019s hitting his forehand \u201cthe best he\u2019s ever hit it.\u201d<\/p>\n
When Moreno takes the courts at Barksdale Tennis Stadium one last time on Sunday, he will feel the duality of the emotions that come with the end of a collegiate career. But amid those sentiments, gratitude remains present.<\/p>\n
\u201cI\u2019m just grateful for the opportunity that I was given to come here to represent the school, myself, my family, my coaches, my friends, and just represent them in the way I\u2019ve represented them,\u201d Moreno said.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"As May draws closer, seniors prepare to say their goodbyes and arrange their futures. Intense emotions accompany such…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":601990,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[565],"tags":[64,63,85,747],"class_list":{"0":"post-601989","1":"post","2":"type-post","3":"status-publish","4":"format-standard","5":"has-post-thumbnail","7":"category-tennis","8":"tag-au","9":"tag-australia","10":"tag-sports","11":"tag-tennis"},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/601989","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=601989"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/601989\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/601990"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=601989"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=601989"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=601989"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}