Tennis
Favorite athlete: Andy Roddick
Favorite team: Phillies
Favorite memory competing in sports: Winning District One Team Championship
Most embarrassing/funniest thing that has happened while competing in sports: When a groundhog ran onto the court during our third singles player’s match.
Music on iPod: Imagine Dragons
Future plans: Go to college and play Division 1 tennis
Words to live by: “Success is a journey, not a destination. The doing is more often important than the outcome.” – Arthur Ashe
One goal before turning 30: Visit Ireland
One thing people don’t know about me: I like to cook.
Maureen Devlin can remember being a young girl and following her mother around as she gave tennis lessons. She would accompany her mom, mostly stay in the background, and see how her mother tried to make others better at a sport she loved.
It has come full circle for the pair these days. It is the mother, Mary Ellen Devlin, who tries to remain in the background, watching her daughter excel at a sport she has also grown to love.
Mary Ellen Devlin is not only Maureen’s mother, but also her tennis coach at Wissahickon High School where Maureen Devlin, 17, is a senior and on her way to Hershey next week for the PIAA State Class AAA Singles Championship for the third time in four years.
An impressive high school tennis career will come to an end at states. Its birth came many years ago.
“Maureen is the second of our four children,” Mary Ellen Devlin said, “and I was teaching part-time at the Upper Dublin Sports Center. She was the one who always asked to go along with me.”
Thus, this love affair with the sport was born. Maureen Devlin played several sports while growing up, but tennis was always the one in the forefront. She played basketball, volleyball, even ran track, but none compared to the game, set, match feeling.
“I played a lot of sports up until eighth grade, and then I dropped those and wanted to stick with tennis,” Maureen Devlin said. “I like it because it is such an individual sport.
“When you lose in tennis, you can’t look around and try to find someone else to blame. It’s on you.”
Still, one of her best qualities for the Trojans is the way she embraces the team concept.
“I understand how individual tennis really is,” she said, “but at the same time, I also love the idea of being part of a team.”
This was an attribute that caught the eye of her mother/coach early on in Maureen Devlin’s school career.
“She is a team player in a sport that is so much about the individual,” Mary Ellen Devlin said. “For her, it is all about the group. I think she benefited from the other sports she played that were more team sports, and she comes from a large family. Each helped in a way. She really likes the idea of having success as a team.”
And success she has had, both as a team and individually. During each of her four years, Wissahickon won the Suburban One American Conference. The team made the state Team Tennis Championships three times. Last year, she won the District One doubles crown with her younger sister, Katherine. This year, she reached the semifinals in singles, meaning she qualified for the state tournament all four years, three times as a singles player and once for doubles. She reached the state quarterfinals in doubles last year.
“Tennis at this level is not just a seasonal sport,” Mary Ellen Devlin said. “It’s one thing to get out and play on weekends. It’s another thing to train. She’s gotten so good because of the work she has put into it.
“In the last few years, she has really upped her off-court training. For her to keep improving, she has to be dedicated to the off-court training so much.”
Maureen Devlin has yet to make a decision on college, other than knowing she will be playing tennis there.
For much of her tennis career, Maureen Devlin’s only coach was her mother. She has branched out now. Maureen and Katherine Devlin both work out at the Arthur Ashe Youth Tennis and Education Center where they also volunteer in working with younger tennis players.
“My younger sister and I train there and we love running into the players,” she said. “There are some pretty good players there.
And what advice does she offer up-and-coming tennis players?
“If you love playing tennis,” she said, “then find a way to keep playing tennis.”
This is mostly all Maureen Devlin does. She referred to tennis as a “lifestyle” and said she does little more than play tennis and read. She does maintain an “A” average, however.
Tennis has helped her remain grounded. Using the team concept in an individual sport has assisted her in further nurturing the love she has for the sport. It is something she first learned from her mother.
Still, it cannot be all that easy to have your mom as a coach, and your mom as the coach to all your tennis friends, as well.
“You know, sometimes it can be hard,” she said of the mother/daughter and coach/player dynamic all rolled into one. “It’s not just your coach, but also your mom out there. But it is also nice for us. I’m the middle daughter and we enjoy it.
“We found a way to make it work.”
Yes, on the Trojans tennis team, it works. Then again, Maureen is not the only daughter Mary Ellen Devlin has coached.
“Maureen would probably say it is not so much of an issue in tennis,” Mary Ellen Devlin said. “I know I would not want to have to choose who was going to be the five players on a basketball court if my child was one of them. But in tennis, it’s easy. The way it is set up, you play and earn your spot.”
Over the past four years, Maureen Devlin has certainly earned her spot. The team has had great success, and she has excelled individually, as well.
Next week marks her fourth and final trip to the state tournament. She certainly has recognized the significance.
“The key will be to do my best and to play with confidence,” Maureen Devlin said, “and just to make my last time there a special one.”
She already knows it will be a special one, though. For the young girl who used to follow her mother around as she taught tennis to others, so impressed with what her mother could do, the two have come full circle.
Next week, Mary Ellen Devlin will follow her daughter around, watching her play tennis, so impressed with what her daughter can do.
