On a hot summer day in August, varsity tennis players gathered at the UCLA tennis courts to begin their season. Because of the late start to school, practices commenced well before the academic year did.

Led by captains Zoe Woolf ’19, Miayunique South ’19 and Lexie Ben-Meir ’21, the team has played three league matches against Buckley, Milken and Oakwood and has remained undefeated.

The Oracle sat down with two out of the three varsity tennis captains, Woolf  and Ben-Meir, to talk about their experiences as captains and their goals for the team this season.

How does it feel to be a captain this year?

Zoe Woolf [ZW] : Being a senior is really nice because you do have the responsibility of being on top of people, but you also have that responsibility of creating a good environment for everyone, making sure that everyone is doing okay and supporting them.

Lexie Ben-Meir [LB]: It also means being a good ambassador for Archer. When we go to other schools, how we show ourselves to the teams and coaches is really important. You want to be a role model for your teammates. It’s setting an example not just for tennis, but also socially.

What are your goals as a team this year?

ZW: To get to CIFs. Also, just having a really good team connection.

LB: To get to CIF and win our league. We actually have a pretty good shot at winning our league this year—we just have to beat Oakwood. We will hopefully get one more round further in CIF and bring some individual players to the other CIF tournaments.

How has Archer tennis been affected because of the late start to the school year? Was it challenging?

ZW: We started August 13th, so it didn’t really affect us that much. We had more time to practice in the summer, which was a full two hours. Now we have to walk to Barrington, so that shortens our time, but overall, it didn’t really affect us that much.

LB: It might have affected us more positively. We had more time to practice, and the stress of school wasn’t on top of us as we were practicing, which it is right now.