ABOVE: The Fairmont Spring Tennis Team. Back row L to R: Tim Slama, Oliver Thedens, Isaac Thomas, Wylee Frederiksen, Dominick Lund-May, Zach Ashland, Leonardo Fortin, Laura Olsen Middle Row: Jonah Vetter, Anthony Stegge, Colton Schroeder, Tyler Slama, Aiden Mutschler, Jensen Schomberg, Levi Loughmiller Front Row: Simone Castro, Lilly Ortega, Hudson Clayton, Leander Nelson Not pictured: Caden Deuel, Cody Reeves and Jordan Reeves

FAIRMONT — The Fairmont Cardinals spring tennis team will soon take the court for another season.

With eight of their top 10 players returning from last season, the roster has no shortage of experience and a few new additions.

“We’ve got 21 players total registered,” said Fairmont head coach Laura Olsen. “That’s been the most since I’ve started coaching that we’ve ever had in the spring season. My very first year coaching with coach Johnson, I think we had 19. There’s been some years we’ve only had 11. So we’re really excited to have some good solid numbers this year.”

Returning for Fairmont are Lilly Ortega, Tyler Slama, Anthony Stegge, Zachary Ashland, Wylee Frederiksen, Oliver Thedens, Simone Castro and Dominick Lund-May.

With the addition of new players come new challenges, such as getting into shape and up to speed with everything happening when they step onto the court.

“We’re working on building some of our players into more competitive singles players,” said Olsen. “We’ve got a few this year that we’re gonna really lean on in doubles as well.

Kind of trying to play off their strengths, and we’ve got to kind of find some new doubles pairings.”

The team’s additions are vital for the program and give the Cardinals a different look and approach to the game. Some become stronger singles players, and the team has more doubles pairing options.

“Early in the season, we’re always working on some conditioning, kind of getting the rust off,” said Olsen. “We’ve got a handful of players that do try to kind of play in the offseason. They take advantage of some different drills and things they do at Gustavus. Some of them play in some tournaments around the state as well in the offseason, but for some of them, this is their only sport. And so they’re kind of getting back into the groove of playing a sport.”

The team does have a handful of multi-sport athletes who stay busy, but the training becomes specific to the sport.

“Now that spring is here, some of them are multi-sport athletes,” said Olsen. “So they kind of stay busy for a little bit more of the year, but just in general, just kind of working on some conditioning footwork trying to, you know, fine-tune their ground strokes and things like that. But we have been very lucky.

“Really, the first week of practice, we were outside five days in a row. Usually that does not happen in the spring during the first week of practice. We were very fortunate to be able to get out and get some solid work early.”

Looking to build towards a better record this season after closing out last year 3-11. The squad is hoping that the offseason work put in will translate as the conference they are in presents some stout competition

“We’re just hoping to be a little bit more successful, a little more competitive, and be able to hang in some of those tougher matches a little bit longer,” said Olsen. “We’ve got some tough competition in our conference and in our section. We’re really just hoping to be able to compete better than we did last year.”

The Cardinals open their season Tuesday with a 4:30 p.m. match at New Ulm.