Month: April 2025

April 30, 2025

“My dad’s a tennis coach, and I have an older brother and sister who played a bit. They were both very athletic, but whenever they were on the tennis court, I used to go pick up balls for them. I was just eager to get out there. My whole family’s from Japan and moved over before I was born. I was born in Sydney and Australia’s all I’ve ever known, but there were a lot of cultural things I learned. My mum and dad would cook Japanese food at home, and they tried to make sure I knew the language. I try to embrace the positives of both cultures, and it’s been a big part of my identity. I always felt like I had the level and potential to play professionally and do well. But my mum was pretty big on me going to college. She was worried about academics and making sure I had something to fall back on. For me, I knew a few years of getting good work under my belt would be good, too. UNC was the place for me. There’s no better place, and I learned so much there. Playing tennis at the pro level, (more…)

April 24, 2025

“Growing up, we had two tennis courts in front of our house. When I was a little kid, I remember watching all the other kids playing, so my parents signed me up for the tennis school. And from then, I loved it. I didn’t even try football, hockey – it was tennis or nothing for me. Since the beginning, I did quite well. It started with playing a couple of tournaments in the Czech Republic. Once I got to the point where I was playing in other countries, or starting to play internationally, I started to realize that I was doing pretty well, playing pretty well against the guys that were my age around the world. The transition from the juniors to the Futures was tough, though. When I started to play at a higher level, I quickly realized there are no free points. In the juniors, you can get away with a few mistakes from your opponent and take advantage of them being down mentally, but in the Futures, everyone is super focused. It helped me realize that the key to that next level is the mental element and your focus. Even though I’m only nineteen, I feel fortunate (more…)

April 17, 2025

“My first memory of playing tennis was playing a doubles tournament for kids and their moms. I have an older brother, so he played doubles with my mom and I played with my mom’s friend. I lost, but I still remember the moment. My brother wanted to go pro and my dad was a tennis player in Japan, so I said, “Okay, I want to do it too.” I think I was around 10 years old when I made that decision. There were definitely moments where I wanted to do other things. My dad was a very tough man. If we wanted to do something different, like playing soccer, baseball, those kinds of things, my dad would say, “No, you can’t do this. If you want to be a player, just play tennis.” So I did. Sometimes it was tough, but there were lots of moments that were enjoyable as well. Im remember playing the Junior French Open and after I lost, I called my mom and said, “I can’t do this anymore.” But it’s ups and downs. At the end of the day, even after losses, you still love tennis and that’s the reason I can stand here. Even (more…)

April 10, 2025

“I was lucky. My first main coach, Scott, always believed in me. He always thought I had the potential. Did I believe that? I don’t know. Probably not, but I was the guy that always took it one step at a time. I was good in juniors, but I wasn’t insane. I wasn’t winning two slams. I knew I was going to college for a couple of years and then I was going to play afterwards. It’s interesting seeing this core group of Americans that are a little younger than me. I don’t take it personally, not always being in the conversation. Those guys, Fritz, Tommy, they’re top 10 in the world now, Foe is making semis. Just Sinner, Alcaraz, all these guys, the level they’re producing is crazy. Again, I don’t view that as a negative. If I were to be making deep runs in tournaments consistently, making the semis of slam, yeah, there would be more. But I haven’t done that, so I can’t really expect that. One thing about me, is it did take me a while to break through. I don’t really think that helps you in terms of the spotlight. If you’re 25 when you (more…)

April 2, 2025

“I’ve definitely struggled at times with my identity. I was born in New York, but I never really lived there. I spent my life in Japan until I was 13, then we all moved to Spain. I’ll always have that ‘Daniel’ on my last name, which if I’m in Japan, people are like, “Oh, where’s that from?” And when I lived in Spain, I did struggle quite a bit in the first few years with micro-racism. I ended up being very fond of Spain, but it was tough the first couple of years. My dad really wanted to move because he was in a very typical Japanese corporate life, and it was killing him. He was the one really passionate about tennis, so we followed his idea. It was a busy childhood. I’d play tennis all day and then study the rest of the time. I barely had days off and didn’t really get to play much with my friends. It’s crazy when I think about it now and those are things that I do regret a bit, but they weren’t really in my control. My sister was the talented one in the beginning. I was good enough to tag (more…)