By Kohl Jackson
OBU hosts a variety of club sports on campus for students to take part in including volleyball, disc golf, climbing, etc. One growing club among these is the tennis and pickleball club led by Jonah Sevier and Baylie Back. This group, formerly known as racket club, meets twice a week on Tuesdays and Thursdays for an hour and a half with scheduled tournaments for members to travel to every other month.
The start of club tennis on campus spans before the current leadership, beginning with the school’s official tennis team disbanding.
“When the OBU tennis team was taken away, club tennis was born,” stated Sophomore co-chair Jonah Sevier.
Sevier estimated that he has personally played tennis for eight years and he still carries his passion for the sport as he has entered a leading role for the club for the past two years.
“Tennis is seen more as a niche sport and so what I love about club tennis is just the ability to go out and to join in a community that I wouldn’t normally have known people. Like I wouldn’t have met half to seventy-five percent of the people that I’ve met in the club, but thanks to tennis I’m able to get to know different people on campus and really get to spread who I know and my outreach on campus through a sport that I love to play,” he continued.
Other members of the club share similar sentiments when they talk about what it’s like to play together each week.
“I really like it because I’m able to continue playing a sport that I really, really love while being able to still be kind of competitive, which is pretty cool. It’s also a lot of fun playing tennis at a religious school because we can pray for each other…” said Freshman student Kaylan Griffin, head of tennis.
“I’ve been playing tennis for about ten years now or so. So a long time. I just recently started playing pickleball about a year ago.”
The club added that they did have to cancel an upcoming tournament, nevertheless the team is looking to grow and compete more often next year.
“It is kind of hard because we don’t have that many people, but if it grows we can go to a lot more,” Griffin explained.
As of two years ago, pickleball was added to the tennis club due to its recent rise in popularity. This sport has been attributed as one of the prominent reasons the tennis and pickleball club continues to grow.
Sophomore Baylie Back, who is currently in charge of this portion of the club has built a community with her fellow members that she actively plays pickleball with.
“Being a part of running this club has helped me have an outlet where I can play my favorite sports and connect with others. Even though the club isn’t the biggest on campus, it’s made me realize that the people who show up truly want to be there and that’s what I value most from this club.”
As they keep looking to grow in numbers, the tennis and pickleball club remains open for any new members to join, emphasizing that all skill levels are welcome.
“We play casually and competitively. We’re all for teaching people how to play. We aren’t going to come out here and ridicule people. We want to just play the sport and enjoy the sport. Enjoy it with others who either have played for ten years or played for ten seconds and we just want to enjoy the same things we enjoy,” Sevier concluded.
Anybody interested in the joining the club may reach out and follow their official Instagram account @obu_tennisandpickleball.
