Blackwell punishes opponents, looks to repeat
By Jason Devaney
Brooke Blackwell looks like a tennis player.
She's tall, lean and has a killer forehand. She keeps her hair out of her face with a white Nike visor. Her groundstrokes are athletic and powerful, but graceful at the same time.
A senior at Marshall, Blackwell is a tennis player.
"Brooke is a phenomenal player," Marshall coach Robin Crider said at a recent match. "Her training routine has not been as consistent as in the past, but I tell you what, you put her on the court and she's a machine. It's just phenomenal what she can do. When you got it, you got it."
Blackwell certainly has got it. Standing 5-foot-9, she uses her height to her advantage. Her long arms lead to one fluid motion when she smacks the ball across the net. Her strokes are long, and her finish invokes images of a golfer after hitting a soft fade with a 7-iron – high hands with the club held up.
It is this motion that has given Blackwell so much success on the court. After spending her first two years of high school at the Tennis Center at College Park – she played tennis and took academic classes there – Blackwell entered Marshall last year and had an immediate impact on the tennis team. She won the Liberty District singles title and finished fourth in the Northern Region tournament.
This season, she is one of the select favorites to win a region crown.
"This year, of course my goal is to win districts again," Blackwell said. "That would be awesome to go out here in my senior year doing that again. But I am just focusing on the team, making the team stronger, getting practicing habits down so they can be great next year."
"Next year" refers to George Mason University, where Blackwell will go to school on a half scholarship for tennis. She is hoping to have just as much of an impact on the Patriots' squad as she has for the Statesmen. Blackwell still trains at College Park, but not as much – she vowed to dedicate more time to her high school team in her senior season.
She also cut down her USTA tournament schedule this spring.
"High school tennis I like a lot more because there's more support there for you," Blackwell noted. "You don't have a lot of people on the sidelines wanting you to lose to benefit themselves in the tournament. You have people all wanting you to win, you have your team behind you and it's all positive energy. I really like it."
During Marshall practices, Crider tries to teach and demonstrate to her players how to hit certain shots or how to react to an opponent on defense. But she sometimes needs something – or someone – to help illustrate her point.
Enter Blackwell.
"She's such an asset in team practice because if we're trying to work on something in particular, I'll say, 'Let's have Brooke hit a few,'" Crider said. "Learning athletics is very visual, and she hits the ball pretty much clean. It's our DVD. It's our live DVD."
Blackwell is 7-0 this season (as of deadline for this edition of The Times) and has a few more matches remaining in the regular season before district and region tournament play.
"Her strength is probably off the ground; she can hit with power from anywhere off the ground and if you take a risk, she can usually have the answer," said Crider. "You dial her number, she's gonna answer."
In the form of a wicked forehand, no doubt.