Next week begins our fall/winter league. Last year, my team ended up in sixth place out of ten teams. Not bad, but not so great, either.

Point-wise, there was a sizable spread between the first and last place teams. But having played those teams twice each, I noticed something interesting. Aside from a couple of big hitters, the skills of the first place team weren’t all that much different from those of the last place team. Everyone had game, but at the end of the season, one team had earned the right to play in a higher division this year, while the other team was going down.

I wondered what accounted for the wide gulf in results between these two comparable teams? At least some part of it–probably a large part of it–had to be mental.

I decided to spend a little time looking at my own team’s statistics. Out of 72 matches last season, my team played 25 super tiebreaks. (A super tiebreak replaces the third set in this league.) If you find yourself in a super tiebreak, your opponents aren’t blowing you off the court. You’ve already won a set. You obviously have the skills to win the match. Whether or not you do is mostly mental. Continue reading “Winning the Tiebreak” →