Starting with just a few members in Fall 2025, the San Francisco State University tennis club has been on the rise. 

With dedicated leadership and the promotion of the club on various social media platforms, their online activity has attracted more students to get involved through tryouts, events and practices. 

Tennis club vice president and coach Kyle Benitez grew up playing tennis and joined the club last fall when there were just a few members, including freshmen Abby Moore, Juan Padilla, Luke Levin, and Jared Santos. Benitez said that after building a bouncing community through great leadership, the club has gotten three times bigger than it was before.

“Last semester, when I joined, there were also a couple of others, such as Juan, Abby, Luke and Jared, who were some players I’ve made friends with, and us being friends and becoming really close brought the team morale up and the vibes, and just made us more passionate for tennis,” Benitez said. 

The club was able to host its first ever tournament, the Gator Open, where 44 students played on the campus tennis courts from 8 a.m. to 6 p.m. on April 4.

“A lot of people came, including people who were members of the club and also non-members. It was awesome and fun,” Benitez said. “We got to hang out, play some tennis and watch some good tennis games. Food and drinks were also there. And it was great. It was great vibes all around in the SFSU tennis courts.”

Senior Hannia Acosta is an international student who joined the club three years ago during her freshman year. Acosta got involved with the club as the social media manager and later became vice president for two years. Throughout her time with the club, Acosta struggled to find people to play tennis.

“When I started at the tennis club, I was a little bit lost,” Acosta said. “I literally had no one to start the club with, as everyone was either graduated or inactive. My point for bringing the club back from the inactivity that we’re in was to create that community.”

Senior Alex Hernandez was drawn to the club on Instagram and is experiencing his first semester with the team. 

“We are working really hard because we are practicing three days a week for almost four hours,” Hernandez said. “Our coaches, Kyle and Juan, know how to put on a good practice. They just have a lot of passion for the sport, and they are encouraging and want to see their players do well… I think Kyle, Juan, and the rest of the officers do a great job to try to be flexible with everyone and make sure everyone can make it to practice.”

Moore is one of the two social media managers who have been helping promote the club. She said the club’s major progress came from all the people who got involved in the board leadership.

“Last semester, there wasn’t as much social media, but it was slowly building up,” Moore said. “In the spring semester as Zara Khan and I and a few other people joined on the social media and the board numbers, we really focused on reaching out to people who are on Instagram.”

The tennis club’s board leadership mentions the lack of funding and renovation as a challenge and a source of stress in leading the club. According to Padilla, the courts’ cracked surfaces, graffiti on banners and leaking water make the playing conditions unsanitary and in need of revival. 

“We’re not a well-known club here, we don’t have a lot of funding, and we’re struggling right now,” Padilla said. “A lot of the expenses come out of pocket from our players, as they pay for their own uniforms, pay to go to our own tournaments, and then transportation, such as Sacramento, Berkeley and Stanford.”

The tennis club attended the Golden Bears Invitational at University of California, Berkeley as their first tournament of the spring semester. On Saturday, April 18, the club’s competitive team traveled to California State University, Sacramento, for a friendly match and preparation for the upcoming United States Tennis Association tournament in the fall. 

Hernandez participated in the Invitational tournament and describes his team as encouraging and supportive in the tournament.

“The first tournament that I went with the club was the Berkeley tournament which was really fun. We all met up, and played and supported each other. It’s a really good environment here in the club as everyone’s really nice and encouraging,” Hernandez said.

While tennis is not as spotlighted at SFSU, the university has one of the biggest tennis courts in the city, second only to the Lisa & Douglas Goldman Tennis Center in Golden Gate Park with 14 courts behind Maloney Field. 

Padilla experienced a similar start to his fellow board officers, first as a player and later appointed to club project manager and head coach. Padilla came with four years of high school varsity tennis and one valley championship, recalling intense practices he put on for the club this semester. 

“If you ask the players, they probably say I’m [making it] hard on them,” Padilla said. “I make them do a lot of conditioning. But I think that’s kind of a thing that happens in sports. It all starts with the foundations, the fundamentals. It’s all in the ground stroke and conditioning.”

Padilla said his goal is for the team to grow competitively for future contests.

“My goal for this semester is to try to build a consistent team, try to have people who are staying here and will return next semester to improve immensely,” Padilla said. “That way, next year we can put up a competition.”