By Chris Oddo | @TheFanChild | Monday February 8, 2021
Even for the brightest junior prospects, the challenge of making the transition to the pro game can be daunting. Whitney Osuigwe knows it well. The American was a Roland Garros Girls’ Singles champion in 2017, joining a long list that includes such tennis luminaries as Gabriela Sabatini, Martina Hingis, Justine Henin and Simon Halep.
Osuigwe was the first American woman to win that title in 28 years in 2017, and she was also a junior No.1. Nearly four years later, and still only 18, she’s still searching for the secret to unlocking her game on the WTA Tour.
“Gosh, it's so hard,” American legend Lindsay Davenport told Tennis Now when we asked her about players making the transition from juniors to pros. “You see players sometimes make it seem so seamless, look so easy, like Coco Gauff. Back in my day it was Capriati or whoever. The reality is it's brutal. It is a very tough transition for 97, 98 percent of the players that come through.”
After a difficult 2020 that sapped her confidence, Osuigwe is more interested in dialing down expectations and moving things along at her own pace. The pressure is there but she’s learning how to deflect it.
"I worked really hard during the off-season and I've just been focusing on being happy on court and obviously touching up on a few little things and I think that played a big part in Dubai,” Osuigwe told Tennis Now from Melbourne during her two-week quarantine, after an impressive qualifying run in Dubai. "I didn't really have any expectations, that was something that I was focusing on, not putting too much pressure on myself, just enjoying myself on court and knowing that the results would follow."
Parents Play a Major Role
Osuigwe says she struggled to find her game in 2020 for a variety of reasons, and she felt the weight of everything crashing down around her as wins were hard to come by in 2020.
When that happened she had to lean on the support of her father, Desmond, who has been her longtime coach, as well as her mom, who Osuigwe says is the glue that keeps the family together with her tireless work behind the scenes. She says her parents have been an enormous help.
“I would honestly call them crying a lot after losing matches or just after a bad practice," she said. "I'm very close to my parents so I would give them insights on certain things that were going on in my personal life and they were always there supporting me, they did what parents do and they were the best.”
After a brilliant run through qualifying in Dubai this winter, things are once again looking up for the talented American, who will bid for her first main draw win at a Slam on Tuesday at the Australian Open against Lin Zhu of China.
"I think it's still a learning process for both of us right now,” one of her coaches (along with Jordan Belga and her father, Desmond), Mat Cloer, told Tennis Now.
Cloer started working with Osuigwe last fall and says he was impressed by the fact that she moved from Bradenton to Orlando in order to focus on her game.
"We spent a ton of time on court,” he said. “Whitney got an apartment here in Orlando, so she's here. That was kind of one of the non-negotiables for me. 'Hey look if this is going to work it's not going to be like I'll see you a week there or a week here,' If I am going to be able to help you I need you here all the time."
Those hard yards have started to pay dividends already.
"I think it was just a team effort on all sides, to put in the hard yards," Cloer said. "I think through that it has built her confidence. Obviously it was great for her to go to Dubai and pull off some matches, especially that last one [in qualifying] where she was down and out, down a set and 5-2, and just kept great composure and never stopped believing and was able to find a way.
"So I think it's a lot of different things. I think definitely the strength and conditioning side of things has definitely helped. I think just having consistency on a day-do-day basis--and credit to Whit for just putting in the yards."
It’s a Mind Game
Much like Iga Swiatek, who won the Roland Garros title in 2020 with a sports psychologist playing a big role in her success and her ability to block out the pressure, Osuigwe is eager to clear out the clutter from her mind and just let her game do the talking.
"The only person I have anything to prove anything to is myself,” she said.
A difficult 2020 season helped Osuigwe realize that her life doesn’t depend on her tennis results. She needed to separate the two and find a happier balance.
"Obviously when coronavirus hit it made a lot of things a lot tougher,” she said. “Also my results weren't the best and I think I based me wanting to play tennis on my results and I based how I looked at myself on my results and obviously when I wasn't doing good then mentally I was not good. And I've learned that me, as a person, is not based on my results. So if I'm able to separate the two and just keep working hard and focusing on my happiness and controlling what I can control and the results, they will follow."
Davenport, like many others, is impressed with Osuigwe’s athleticism and her coachability. She thinks that the American’s time will come, and there’s no need to panic.
“I think it's not easy when you see your peers kind of breaking through and being so successful,” Davenport said. “You start to think, Why isn't that me? Why aren't I? You have to remember it's not a race of who gets there first, it's just about you and your journey and your process. Maybe it happens at 20, maybe it's 25, maybe it's this year. You just never know. But you've got to kind of keep sticking with it and keep going down your own path, not really worry about the others.
“She's a great athlete,” Davenport said. “She's going to be there and she's going to compete every single match. If it were me, I would be really working with her on just playing a little bit more offensive tennis a little more naturally, a little easier. I'm sure she's doing that.”
Working with Osuigwe in Melbourne is American coach Jordan Belga. He keeps in touch with Cloer as he guides the 18-year-old through her practice and fitness regimen. He too believes that the American can have a great career.
"I think she definitely has a good amount of upside with her game overall," he said. "I definitely love her baseline aggressive mentality. She's a very, very quick mover as well, which I am a big fan of."
Belga is hoping that he can be there when Osuigwe earns her first main draw win at a major. She has lost her previous four matches at the majors, but something about 2021 feels different.
"The potential for her is definitely there,” he said. “I don't want to say I'm a prophet or anything, because you never know what can happen down the road, but I definitely have full confidence in her ability. We are just going to take it one day, one week, one match at a time, and do our best to focus on what she needs, her strengths, her areas of focus, and do the best we can with that."