College Tennis on Tennis Chantenel

[Chopin]

Currently, college tennis is being shown on the Tennis Channel, which is often interesting to watch. I'm wondering, though, who is calling the lines in these matches. The coverage showed one player hitting a shot a foot inside the baseline (camera clearly showing it) and the ball being called out. Both announcers commented on it. There are umpires for these matches who can obviously overrule calls, but who is calling these lines? The players? Are there linespeople? It's unclear to me from the coverage.

As an aside, tennis really needs to get up to speed with line-calling. All the calls should be automatic on the pro level and I think the technology is almost there to implement at the college and USTA level in the near future.

 

[Deon Sanders]

College players call their own lines

The chair only overrules

The problem with your technology angle is the rules have to be uniform for all of the teams and many schools do not have play sight or equivalent on courts they play on. It is very expensive.

Even Ohio State doesnt have play sight at their outdoor site and it is only active on two indoor courts

 

[jacob22]

Those are all Playsight courts at the USTA National campus. How good is it at line calling?

 

[dr. godmode]

Yeah there is a lot of cheating in college tennis. The players are under a lot of pressure so they get desperate. You lose and you run miles at 4 or 5am in any weather. Lose and get yelled at. Lose and get kicked off the team. Lose and lose you scholarship.

This is one of the reasons they play lets. Aces getting called let.

 

[jacob22]

And they’re a lot more annoying with their constant “come ons”, at least today.

 

[accidental]

They shoul televise futures if they’re going to televise college tennis

Futures is a much higher standard