Sporting its youngest squad in seasons, No. 19 NC State women’s tennis has returned from a three-week road trip. After the Pack’s 5-2 win against Old Dominion on Saturday, let’s go over a few key takeaways from head coach Simon Earnshaw’s team after the first month of play.

Road trip lessons

After an impressive win against then-No. 10 Pepperdine to start its 2025 campaign, NC State took to the road to compete in the ITA Kickoff Weekend against Texas and SMU in a pair of nonconference matches.

While the Wolfpack pulled off an impressive win over Pepperdine, NC State fell flat while competing at the all-important ITA Kickoff Weekend. With a chance to play more valuable, resume-building matches against ranked teams on the line, the Wolfpack fell to then-No. 15 Ohio State and was upset by Texas Tech in the event’s consolation round.

Earnshaw said the loss against the Buckeyes was because of a lack of execution — something pivotal for a high-pressure match such as this.

“We try to play very proactive and moving forward, and we were super passive and we just didn’t give a good show of ourselves against a very good team,” Earnshaw said. “So that was disappointing. And then Texas Tech, it was kind of more of the same — people not handling the outcome of the Ohio State match well.”

NC State’s roster currently consists of seven underclassmen and just one upperclassman in junior Anna Zyryanova. For almost every Wolfpack player, a road match against Ohio State was the first high-pressure environment of their collegiate careers — something tough to acclimate to and emerge with a victory as a young team early in the season.

It seems if the Pack’s young team internalized its performance at the ITA Kickoff Weekend — the red-and-white played then-No. 10 Texas to the brink in its next match. A close 4-3 loss to the Longhorns came down to the wire and while Earnshaw said losses like this do count as lessons learned for this young team, there’s a balance between winning and taking your lumps after losses.

“It’s important and it’s a great experience, but you can’t take too many punches until you can’t get back up off the floor,” Earnshaw said. “So it’s a balancing act.”

NC State did manage to get back up off the floor with back-to-back wins at SMU and against Old Dominion, hoping it can extend the streak to three against No. 6 Michigan on Friday.

Laki leads the way

The brightest spot for the Wolfpack this season has been No. 52 standout freshman Michaela Laki. The Greece native has upset not one, but two Top-10 ranked opponents in her team’s matches against Pepperdine and Old Dominion.

Laki quickly earned Earnshaw’s approval to command Court 1 at the beginning of the season and she’s proven why she deserves it with a pair of big-time wins. Former players such as Amelia Rajecki, Diana Shnaider and Alana Smith, have owned the Court 1 spot for the Pack’s past few seasons, and though it’s early, Laki could be on track to joining those players as some of the most impactful in program history.

However, while she’s shown potential, Laki will have to show she can play at her highest level week-in, week-out. With plenty of tough tests ahead, she’ll have lots of chances to keep proving herself against the nation’s toughest opponents.

Like Laki, many of the Pack’s players are underclassmen. While she’s leading the bunch, both Laki and the rest of her teammates are learning their way through college tennis one match at a time.

Even players such as sophomores Gabriella Broadfoot and Kristina Paskauskas, who saw limited playing time last season, are still learning as they go.

“In many ways, they’re first-year starters this year, and they’re still very early in this and you can see it,” Earnshaw said. “It’s still a little bit weighty for them — a lot of responsibility. The matches will help us get there.”

Planting seeds

Earnshaw’s message to the team after its win over Old Dominion centered around staying positive. More specifically, not letting negative thoughts creep in, or not ‘planting a seed’ during matches.

“Sometimes when you plant a seed, no matter where you plant, it might start growing,” Earnshaw said. “And if it’s a weed, you got to cut that thing out as soon as possible. Yeah, we just need to do a better job with game management.”

Earnshaw emphasized this concept when gearing up to play teams such as Michigan in just a few days where there is little to no margin of error for his team.

“If you allow something to happen, it might just happen,” Earnshaw said. “And I felt like we were acting a little too much when things didn’t go our way and maybe not allowing the tennis and the score or maybe the positive pieces to be the kind of the narrative of the match.”

NC State’s third ranked test of the season is set for Friday against the fearsome No. 6 Wolverines. Earnshaw said NC State will have to play its best match of the season to beat them — one with little to no mental slips from his team.

“We’re going to have to really show what we’re capable of against Michigan, because they’re no joke,” Earnshaw said. “Brutally efficient so far in most of their matches, but every day is a different match.”

First serve against the Wolverines is set for 3 p.m. at the J.W. Isenhour Tennis Center in Raleigh.