By Drew Richardson
The squeaking of tennis shoes echoes across the maroon, concrete court. As the yellow tennis ball rockets from each racket, the tension and pressure intensifies inside each player.
Standing at 5 feet, 9 inches, Nicolas Ocana, clad in a black Adidas headband, squats down inches from the net, intensely analyzing his opponent, searching for any sliver of weakness to exploit. While the black headband may hide the sweat-laden, jet-black hair that lies beneath, Ocana’s fierce concentration is anything but hidden.
Hustling to his right to return a shot, Ocana unleashes a devastating forehand shot, slamming the ball down and out of reach to secure him and his opponent, Florian Broska, the point.
Ocana is currently a sophomore tennis player at Mississippi State University, majoring in industrial engineering. Due to the coronavirus pandemic and the shutdown of sports across the country last spring and throughout the summer months, Ocana’s freshman year of tennis was cut short.
Mississippi State’s tennis team could only compete in three conference matches before the coronavirus pandemic took hold and forced the NCAA to cancel all sports for the spring season. As a freshman, Ocana finished with 12 wins and 11 losses playing as a singles player and notched an impressive 13 wins with seven losses while playing doubles. MSU finished with a record of 9-6 in a pandemic-shortened season, going winless in conference play. Currently, the Bulldogs have nine wins and 3 losses on the season, dropping their first two conference matches to Tennessee and Georgia. Ocana sits at four wins and six losses while playing doubles this season.
The pandemic hits
Before hearing the news that all Mississippi State classes were shifting online, many students were enjoying their Spring Break and well-deserved time away from school.
Days leading up to the cancellation of the season, Ocana and the MSU tennis team were still rebounding from a tough loss to the no. 10-ranked Georgia Bulldogs that Sunday, March 8. The team was looking to reset to take on Texas A&M that upcoming Friday, March 13.
Ocana remembered seeing the news that the remainder of his spring tennis season was being snatched away while watching a horror movie with some of his teammates. Talk about irony.
The moment Ocana became aware of the harsh news occurred when one of Ocana’s teammates was watching the SEC Network on their phone. They suddenly saw it was officially being announced the NCAA was canceling all remaining spring and winter sports due to the coronavirus pandemic. After playing tennis for so many years, the idea of his passion being ripped away from Ocana in the blink of an eye didn’t sit well with him.
“When it was announced that we wouldn’t be coming back, I was disappointed; but to be honest, I was more frustrated because I really wanted to come back,” Ocana said. “Playing tennis at this level and being a part of this school, both of these things have truly become a part of me.
Like many people during the initial stages of the pandemic, Ocana wasn’t sure what the future held for him. Being an international student, he chose to return to his native country of Canada, particularly the city of Montreal. Ocana boarded a plane back to Canada the very next day.
However, like many people attempting to travel outside of the United States during the early stages of the pandemic, Ocana’s venture back to Canada didn’t come without its hiccups. According to Ocana’s mother, Lilia, Nicolas had to take four planes to make it back to Montreal. Ocana mentioned that he usually only has to take one connection when going from Starkville to Montreal.
With the uncertainty of Ocana’s safety, Lilia Ocana also had to wrestle with the many unknowns that surrounded the coronavirus. She didn’t know the likelihood of Ocana being able to avoid the contraction of the virus while at the airport or how much of a hassle it would be for Nicolas to get through border patrol.
“That was a very difficult thing,” she said. “We began to see all of the airport and border closures happen all in a matter of like two days. We didn’t know how protected he was going to be, on top of the fact that no one knew how to fully protect themselves from the virus.”
Coming together as a family
Another wrench thrown in the Ocana family’s direction was the unease that came from each family member being in different places during the time that Nicolas was making his way back to Montreal. Lilia Ocana mentioned that she was living in Vancouver at the time while working as an English teacher, and her husband and daughter, Marc-André and Carisa, were living in Montreal.
The idea of the entire family being separated during such a dramatic time was very frightening to Lilia Ocana. Being a close-knit family is something that she said she values. The moment when her son, Nicolas, made it back safely from the United States and the entire family was able to gather under one roof was truly special to her.
“It was a very stressful time when we were waiting for hours while my husband was trying to find a plane ticket and make reservations,” Lilia Ocana said. “I was so grateful when we all met in the house. We cherished that moment so much when we were all together as a family, and more importantly that we were in good health.
She credited a strong support system from the MSU tennis team as a major factor in helping her son maneuver through airport reservations and providing ease and relief during such a stressful time.
“He also had great support from his team,” Lilia Ocana said. “He had a lot of support and guidance on how to get to the airport, and many of his friends were also traveling back to Europe, so we knew he wasn’t alone. We knew he wasn’t going to be abandoned.”
Finding support in Starkville
The encouragement and comfort that Ocana felt from his teammates and coaches is a byproduct of one of the most attractive things that MSU and the city of Starkville has to offer to its incoming athletes or students. Ocana mentioned the hospitality of Starkville as one of the first things that took him by surprise when visiting the campus of MSU.
“I think the difference here [Starkville] is that people are really into sports, and they also treat the athletes here really well,” Ocana said. “That’s something that struck me right away.”
Ocana referenced that coming to a small city like Starkville, compared to a metropolis like Montreal, brought with it many cultural differences. In particular, Ocana mentioned the French influence in Montreal and the dominant interest in fashion that exists there. For Ocana, Starkville struck him as more of a laid-back and relaxed environment, compared with that of Montreal.
“Another difference here is that it’s truly a college-town environment,” Ocana said. “That’s the thing for me; there are obviously more things to do in Montreal, but the small-town feel of Starkville is something that I really love.”
Ocana said that the concept of a strong culture is also something that is stressed within the men’s and women’s tennis programs at MSU. Ocana referenced that Head Coach Matt Roberts likes to set aside 15 minutes before a practice or after a match to meet with his team to gauge how each player is doing mentally or how their past week has gone.
The acronym T.E.A.M. is used to assess each player’s toughness, energy, accountability and maturity during the week. A player’s toughness can be seen in how consistent they were in practice or even doing schoolwork or studying for tests. Maintaining positive energy during a match can be the deciding factor in keeping the momentum on your team’s side.
Ocana mentioned that having good accountability can be seen when a player is able to stay level-headed during a tough week in school or practice and not letting outside obstacles affect their play on game day. The last category, maturity, can be seen in how each player can maintain their focus in either a practice or game. Having great maturity equates to decreasing the number of dips in production a player has during the week and not letting their emotions get the best of them in a high-pressure situation.
Maturity is one of the critical areas that Ocana has improved in since coming to Mississippi State as a freshman. Florian Broska, a junior tennis player at MSU and business management major, said that Ocana has become a more vocal player in the past year.
“He’s becoming more of a leader,” Broska said. “In the beginning, he mostly listened to the older players and followed what they did, but as he’s learned more and gained experience, he feels like he has more of a voice to speak up.”
Training during the pandemic
Ocana might have been able to gain even more experience during the spring season of his freshman year had it not been canceled due to the coronavirus pandemic. The worldwide shutdown and closure of courts in Canada also set Ocana back in his training when he arrived in Montreal and couldn’t practice or play tennis.
Ocana said all of the indoor courts were closed until May. During that time, Ocana said he was only able to run and keep up his conditioning. The beginning of May marked Ocana's first return to the tennis courts.
Soon after returning to practice, Ocana received an invitation to play against some of Canada's best college tennis players. Tennis Canada invited Ocana to compete in a league made up of 15 male players and eight female players from Montreal and the surrounding area.
Tennis Canada is the national governing body of tennis that exists within Canada. This group of players included junior players, transitional players and players who were currently playing on the NCAA circuit.
Some notable players included Alexis Galarneau, a fifth-year senior at North Carolina State University, and Dan Martin, a current senior at Dartmouth University. Each player played on average three matches per week, and a points system was used to assess who would be crowned the champion.
Each match consisted of three sets, and each set a player one accounted for one point. Ocana was able to play his way into the top eight but ultimately finished sixth in the rankings.
Despite not being able to win the tournament, Ocana said he was able to learn many valuable lessons from the experience and was thankful to be playing tennis at a time when so many players around the world were unable to.
“I was very thankful for those matches that I got to play. I had a pretty good summer considering the circumstances surrounding COVID-19,” Ocana said. “I played some great players and learned a lot.”
Growing as a bulldog
Ocana referenced one of his biggest struggles during his freshman season was performing well under pressure.
"I want to get more reps while under pressure. I need to do a better job of responding better in high-pressure situations,” Ocana said. “That’s definitely something I want to be more consistent at in the future.”
Ocana references a tennis match last year in which MSU was playing the Georgia Bulldogs in a conference match. That day, Ocana said the entire Mississippi State team was struggling, and many of his teammates had already lost their individual matches. Because of this, Ocana felt even more pressure to win to avoid adding another loss to his team. Ultimately, Ocana was not able to come through and ended up on the losing end.
Coming in as a freshman and dealing with the nerves that come during a high-intensity college tennis match isn’t something that everyone is born with. Ocana knows it takes time and looks forward to being in more of those moments in his career.
What might be even more surprising than Ocana being able to play tennis during a worldwide pandemic is the fact that coming to play tennis at Mississippi State wasn’t initially apart of Ocana's or his family’s plan.
Mrs. Ocana said that she was stunned when her son told her that he wanted to take his talents to Starkville, Mississippi.
“Mississippi State was not even a part of the plan,” Lilia Ocana said. “We had visited other places that were closer to Canada and even some schools in California, but Mississippi State was definitely a school that unexpectedly emerged as the leader.”
She referenced the discipline that her son saw in the team when he visited and the closeness between the players and coaches. She said this sealed the deal for him.
“He went there and met the team and was convinced to the bone," she said.
Along with sustaining his high level of play in clutch moments as a tennis player, Ocana also had to adjust to the language barrier upon arriving at MSU. Coming from Montreal, where the primary language is French, Ocana had to become more accustomed to speaking English and the different nuances associated with the language.
“I think the first big adjustment was my English when I came here. I’m originally a French speaker, and there were a lot of words that I needed to work on,” Ocana said. “Words like “love” and “like” and realizing they don’t quite mean the same thing in every situation.”
Another obstacle Ocana faced early on, like many freshman students before him, was learning to manage his time well. Pursuing a major in industrial engineering is no small task, especially for a college athlete.
Ocana knows that managing your time well in college means cutting back on usual pleasures like social media or Netflix in order to get enough sleep to perform well on the tennis courts and also in the classroom.
“Early on, it was tough to find that balance between schoolwork and sports. I didn’t have much free time to spend with friends, but I knew I had to be responsible,” Ocana said.
Looking to the future
Leaving a lasting legacy at Mississippi State is something that is very important to Ocana, and it’s something that he hopes to achieve during his time in Starkville. When all is said and done, Ocana said he wants to be remembered for more than just winning tennis matches and individual accolades, but also as someone who his teammates could rely on to leave every ounce of energy on the court and provide encouragement to his teammates.
“I want to be remembered as a guy who was accountable to his teammates, and every time I stepped on the court, everybody had confidence in me to get the win, and I played every match like it was my last," Ocana said.
By all accounts, Ocana seems to be fulfilling his role as a selfless teammate and leader on the tennis team. Broska noted that giving encouragement to other players was one of Ocana’s most impressive character traits. What is even more impressive to Broska is how effortless it seems to be for Ocana.
“He treats people really well and likes to help people,” Broska said. “He’s very good at giving positive feedback when one of our teammates does something good, and it doesn’t seem forced.”
At the end of the day, what may be even more fulfilling than leaving a legacy at MSU, is making memories that will last forever, and Ocana recognizes this.
“The moments that we have here in college, they go by so fast, and I want to make lasting memories with my coaches and teammates because those memories last forever,” Ocana said. “I want to be able to enjoy every moment we have in these four years I have. I want it to be the best it could be.”