Category: Story

May 29, 2025

“My first memory of playing tennis was actually the first shot I ever hit. I remember what came before that and what came after that. My parents were playing at a park, and I had brought all my sketchbooks. I got bored and asked my dad if I could borrow his racket. I hit the ball and I was addicted after that. I did lots of activities as a kid, but tennis always dominated. There are so many different aspects to why I loved it. You have to be fit, physically and mentally. You’re also able to be creative on the court. There’s just so many sides to the game, and I was obsessed with that. You’re never done learning. In my consciousness, I think there was a moment when I was 16 when I realized I could play tennis professionally. But if you ask people in my life that have known me since I was five or six, they say I knew when I was 10, because I told them my goals and my goals were very tennis oriented. I think it’s earlier than I remember, but by 16 I knew I wanted to be a pro player. Moving (more…)

May 22, 2025

“I moved to the US when I was around 13, 14 years old. Honestly, I was just excited to leave home and pursue the opportunity to play tennis. I played a lot in Europe, but had never been to the States, so I was like, ‘You know what? This is perfect.” Looking back, the only thing I obviously regret is leaving behind friends. I lost a lot of those connections over time, and making new friends as you get older is tough. But I moved to Florida with my aunt, who’s a psychologist, and it helped me get through the tough moments that came with such a big move. Some of the best advice she gave me was, “You know you’re here for a reason. Keep working, and something will happen.” There’s lots of hard times in tennis, especially when you’re not doing well. If you’re not good, the industry will just move onto the next one. There’s no care at all in the world for you. During my pro career, I’ve been lucky enough to move up quickly, but the transition from being a junior was hard. Adjusting to the level that these guys play at was difficult. Everyone (more…)

May 16, 2025

“Tennis didn’t run in my family. No sport really did – my parents are both electrical engineers. It was a bit…out of coincidence. There was a push into both academics and sports from my family, but there was a strong push from my dad on sport. Initially, there was actually a lot of resistance from my end in terms of going fully into tennis. Once I finished high school, I went overseas and the emotions of my journey really hit me. I was 17 when I moved. Having it be my first time without my friends, my family…I struggled. During that time, I was enrolled in the University of Sydney, but deferred for two years.Before I went to Spain, though, my eventual college coach approached me and wanted me to come to Illinois. That’s when I started leaning towards the US college path. In the back of my mind, I still wanted to make it pro. Some people around me weren’t sure about the idea of college, but I was pretty committed to it. I came up with this formula in my head on the likelihood of making it pro after going to college, and wanted to prove it right (more…)

May 8, 2025

“My brother and I would play with balloons, setting up the couch as a net, and just smack it back and forth. Then every Sunday night, my mom and I would play against my brother and dad – a little mixed doubles action. From there, I just fell in love with the game. My brother playing in college and my mom being a tennis pro, I always grew up in the tennis environment. I just had great role models to look up to, and I’m really lucky to have them. When you break the top 100 as a tennis player, I think that’s a huge goal that everyone has. When you do it, it’s this huge weight lifted off your back. When that happened for me, it was a huge milestone. From there, I was into so many more WTA main draws and had more opportunities. I think comparison is the thief of joy, in tennis and in life. It’s super hard, because we’re out here, seeing the same players every week. It’s natural to compare, but I think the biggest thing is to just focus on your journey. What are your goals? What are you trying to work on (more…)

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…)

March 20, 2025

“I wrote a note to my parents when I was seven years old trying to negotiate that I didn’t need to go to school. I just needed to go on a tennis court, because I wanted to become a tennis professional. For whatever reason, my dad threw me into judo at a young age, but I never really liked it. My dad was a tennis coach, but didn’t actually really like tennis growing up himself. He somehow just got thrown out there and tried to make a living. Every time I went to the tennis club, though, my parents had to fight to get me off the court. I always knew what I wanted to become. There was never a question of going to college if I didn’t perform well in the juniors. College didn’t really exist in my mind. I knew as soon as I finished high school, I was going to go play on the tour and go after my dreams. Top 10 was always a big dream. Of course, winning a Grand Slam would have been the ultimate dream – that’s what you play for. Unfortunately, that didn’t happen. Struggles are inherently a part of the sport. (more…)