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Double the scheduling. Double the recruiting. Double the matches. Coaching both the men’s and the women’s programs at a college can be a big job.

We put the following question to a number of coaches:

Q) What are the challenges of coaching both programs? How do you juggle both jobs while taking care of both programs equally?

Chase Hodges, Georgia Gwinnett Men and Women

There are many challenges when coaching two different teams. The major challenge is time management. Time is limited so it has to be managed very well when you have two teams. The majority of time put into the programs is actually not on court. It is the countless hours spent recruiting to make sure that your programs have the high quality student-athletes that are necessary to compete at the highest level. I feel that our success at GGC has largely been due to the fact that we try to identify student-athletes that have a very high standard for themselves. This way, I know that they will have a work ethic that demands total respect from their teammates.

It's a constant juggling process. You must have good assistant coaches and you must have student-athletes willing to step into leadership roles. The key is to realize that in order to be successful then there has to be a relentless effort to maximize the potential of every student-athlete on each team. Our goal is to play our best tennis in May when it matters most, so we try to instill an environment where our student-athletes see the bigger picture instead of getting caught up in issues that have little to no effect on our team success.