Starting the training to achieve her dream in tennis
I had the pleasure of meeting Likhitha “Lucky” Kancherla and her parents in December 2017. At the time, Lucky was a junior in high school and was looking for a coach who could create a development plan and program to help her to improve her game substantially. It was an excellent fit for both of us as my passion and interest is to develop players as part of a systematic and organized approach. It is this approach that I followed myself as a player and to which I credit much of my success at all levels of the game. Over the course of the next 19 months, Lucky and I worked together to help her improve and achieve her dream of earning a Division 1 tennis scholarship. Below are the key areas that contributed to Lucky’s success.
Improving her technique for a stronger foundation
Often a starting point for me with a player is to evaluate their technique and to help them make necessary improvements to set a solid foundation for their game. With Lucky, we dedicated much time in practice for her to develop her swings, improve her timing and feel for the ball. This translated to higher consistency and more power in her strokes.
“It wasn’t until I had Harsh as my coach that I realized the importance of repetition in making improvements. When you practice a certain technique or skill for 15 minutes everyday for months, you don’t have to think about it as much. It becomes second nature.” – Lucky Kancherla
Instilling belief and motivation for her to go after her goals
As I begin a new coaching relationship with a player, I try to learn about their background and experiences prior to them joining me. This enables me to gain insights into their motivations, psychology, and the environment around their tennis endeavor. As I started to learn more about Lucky, I saw a highly motivated player who was eager to improve and aspire for a higher level in the game, including reaching the Division 1 college level. However, she didn’t quite believe in her abilities and lacked a coach who could inspire and motivate her to go for her dreams. This is where we worked together to instill greater confidence and a structured plan for her to focus on. Ultimately, our efforts materialized into Lucky earning a tennis scholarship to Western Illinois University – a Division 1 program.
“I had the dream of playing at the highest level from a young age but there wasn’t any direction to my motivation. As I had reached a certain age I felt like I was too old to “make it” (to D1 tennis) and the environment that I was in encouraged those thoughts. It is important to never limit your goals and to have a coach who creates an environment where you can do that.” – Lucky Kancherla
Defining priorities and implementing a long-term plan
As a coach, I believe that one of my differentiating strengths is my ability to define clear priorities and to effectively implement a long-term plan for my players’ development. Therefore, I place an emphasis on being organized and regular with my feedback and communication with players and parents. In this regard, Lucky mentioned how she found my organized communication on her goals, training plans, and match reports to be much more effective for her learning and ability to track her progress versus the sporadic communication of previous coaches.
“I have always been passionate and dedicated to tennis but didn’t have a direction, a plan. Having an organized platform to keep track of my progress was crucial to get to where I wanted to be. It’s hard to find a coach who in addition to the coaching on the court puts effort in the planning and in the tracking of a player’s progress. It took some pressure off of me as well because I knew that I no longer had to worry about where my tennis was heading or what I was doing, it was all laid out for me, I just had to follow it.” – Lucky Kancherla
Participating in and learning from tournament play
To enhance Lucky’s exposure to higher levels of competition, we included national level tournaments in Illinois, Wisconsin and Texas in addition to local tournaments in Minnesota. I traveled with her to several of these events and helped her to prepare mentally and physically prior to her matches. During matches, I charted her game statistics and shared my match evaluations in a structured format. The data was incorporated into her weekly training plan and necessary adjustments were made to improve her training. Lucky also spent time after each match to reflect and share her evaluation of her performance. This systematic approach helped her to focus on the learning and development component of her game rather than on short-term results. Consequently, she felt free to hit her shots rather than playing with pressure which was inhibiting her performances in the past. The tournament experiences were also more enjoyable and positive.
“I played tournaments in the past but it was more result based. It was with Harsh that tournaments were more an area of performance where I could apply what I’ve learned and then find things I can improve on. The action of writing an evaluation of a match made me more aware of the areas I needed to work on and provides some feedback to Harsh. Additionally having it all organized makes it easy for me to look back on previous matches.” – Lucky Kancherla
The above approach that we used to focus our team, including her parents on the development process rather than on chasing results, helped everyone to stay balanced and provide valuable support to Lucky in her efforts.
Improving her fitness for higher levels of play
Prior to joining me, Lucky did not have a structured fitness plan or program which had resulted in a weak fitness base for higher levels of training. She was experiencing persistent arm pain that was limiting her practice time and ability to develop her skills. We addressed this issue by getting her to work with an experienced trainer / physiotherapist and adjusting her tennis load. These steps helped her to overcome the injury, restart her training, and gradually increase her training load.
“I had been doing fitness on my own before I joined but I didn’t know if I was doing the right form or if it was the right training for tennis. Having a trainer was imperative for me as he created a program for me to follow and it was all tennis specific. In addition to helping me physically, this also took pressure off of me because I knew I was doing the right things.” – Lucky Kancherla
Helping her in the college search
In Lucky’s case, we did not rush into the college recruiting process, but rather waited until we felt her game was more developed and ready to showcase to Division 1 coaches. Therefore, it was not until the Spring of her senior year in high school that we started to actively connect with coaches. In addition to setting up her profile on certain widely used platforms for college recruiting, I helped her to develop a video that showcased both her tennis skills and importantly her commitment and strong desire to improve. I believe college coaches are not just looking for players who have proven results, but also those who can elevate themselves and the team to new heights based on the qualities that they bring. I strongly believed that Lucky was one of those players who would be an asset to any team looking to develop a positive and focused culture of excellence. I’m glad that this was recognized by Western Illinois University where she earned a scholarship to join their tennis team and represent them at the Division 1 level!
Overall, it has been a pleasure to coach Lucky and support her passion for the game. I look forward to a bright future for her! I thank her and her family for their belief in me and commitment to our vision and process.
Thank you for taking the time to read about Lucky’s journey and our teamwork to help her reach her goals. We hope this story serves as an inspiration to other players and families to aspire to high goals and to have a plan to get there. Please feel free to reach out to me to share about your journey in the game and I would love to help.
Best,
Harsh
