The Biofile: Luke Jensen

April 18, 2013 | By Scoop Malinowski
Luke_Jensen_Pic

Status: Former ATP Tennis Professional. Former French Open doubles champ. Currently serves as head coach of Syracuse University women’s tennis team.

Date of birth: June 18, 1966 in Grayling, Mich.

First tennis memory: Playing the Firecracker Open at the court in Luddington, Mich. My dad was the high school tennis coach and he always had the Firecracker Open during the Fourth of July, and the Cannonball Classic on Labor Day and during the U.S. Open. Just going out there and competing for the first time, figuring out what the score meant and trying to get the ball in the box and rallying with a wood racquet with the white tennis balls.”

Tennis inspirations: Honestly, probably watching the 1979 Wimbledon on TV live, Bud Collins calling it with Bjorn Borg and Roscoe Tanner. Tanner had the perm going. Left-handed. Goes five sets and him hitting the match point into the side fence, basically into the front row and Borg going down on his knees. And then saying to myself, “I don’t know what I have to do to become a professional tennis player but this is what I want to do. This is just the coolest thing.” Bud Collins’ calls of “Net cord!” And “Chalk dust!” And he just elevated live tennis. The Ice Man Borg and the lefty American, red, white and blue. And then McEnroe-Connors and the whole thing. Tennis was just in a zenith.

Greatest sports moment: I would say it’s a slam dunk—winning the French Open with my brother (Murphy Jensen). But internally—being in the 1996 Australian Open with my brother and sisters (twins Rachel, Rebecca), to be a family of four that come from really nothing in terms of tennis terms, in Luddington, Mich., and now all four of us were in the main draw in the Australian Open in doubles. That was, as a team, we were always a team, the Jensens was about a team concept. And we were all going be on the Tour and do it. That was our real pinnacle.”

Most painful moment: Blowing out my knee and never being able to play again. Going through that, on a daily basis, that when I’m at a major and watching professional tennis, knowing that I can still be there. But you blow your knee out, you have surgery and do everything you can to come back … you just have to move on. I blew my knee out at Coral Springs playing Jonas Bjorkman, going out for a forehand, and split out. It just basically crumbled, annihilated and imploded and I was never the same.

Closest tennis friends: My brother Murphy. We were fishing buddies growing up as munchkins. We got into sports and got into tennis, got a chance to play at the highest level of the game. Still today, we get to travel around and be this thing called “The Jensen Brothers” … whatever we created is through our own energy and enthusiasm. He’s definitely the closest. Outside of my family, I would say probably Richey Reneberg. He used to always get me in trouble, he was the instigator. He would tell me to do something, I’d do it. From winging water balloons at Pete Sampras and doing other crazy stuff … Richey was the instigator and we were really close.

Funniest players encountered: I really had a lot of fun with Andre Agassi before he got serious … that was a lot of fun. Because when he said, “Hey, let’s take off and do something,” it was in a private plane and it was with some celebrity … he paid for everything! It was a shark trip in Australia when he was going to give me $50,000 to take a lap around a shark-infested boat. I mean, it was always something. To me, he was always the funniest guy to be around.

Toughest competitors encountered: The guy I felt never gave me a point in practice or anything was always Jimmy Connors. My first year here as a junior in 1983, Connors took me out basically as a sacrificial lamb and beat the living snot out of me. He didn’t give me any points, but taught me so many things as he continues to do to this day. Whenever I see him, I learn so much from him just based on his philosophy of “You don’t play this to win, you play this to compete.” He just never lets up. He never let up on the media, he never let up on his opponents. Even now, he just wants someone to play against and battle against.

Why you love playing tennis: To be honest, whether it’s a park or whether it’s a final of a Grand Slam or anything … I just like winning. I like going out there and knowing that someone is going to win and someone is going to lose. It doesn’t matter where you are ranked, and it doesn’t matter what your age is … spin the racquet and it starts up zero-zero. Someone is going to serve and someone is going to return the ball. At the end of the contest, if you’ve put in a full effort and have put in the right tactics and have executed correctly, you have a solid shot to win. To me, it’s about putting it on the line. No one can pull you off the court, there are no politics … it’s raw … it’s out there and it’s real. It’s the best thing of all time. Once you leave that arena, it’s political. Either you are out there winning or losing.

Strangest match: I think every match we ever played is kind of out of the ordinary. The first thing that jumps out of my mind, and it’s a match I didn’t even play in, was dealing with Murphy’s disappearance in 1995 at the Wimbledon Championships. We were out of the doubles and we were staying at a house at Wimbledon. And Murphy is playing with Brenda Schultz and they were in the quarters of the mixed-doubles draw, and he honestly just disappears and leaves. And dealing with all the media and it was reality TV. He was running away from the media and they were trying to chase him up in Scotland. It wasn’t a match, but it was a situation … and to do it at Wimbledon. Coming from our humble tennis beginnings, and now you are this center of attention because your brother is a knucklehead and just doesn’t want to play Wimbledon? How do you not want to play Wimbledon? But Murphy was just being Murphy.

Most embarrassing tennis memory: I know there are lots of them. When I was a junior player, I went out and I had on my warm up gear. One time, I pulled my warm up gear down and didn’t have any shorts on.

Favorite players to watch: Number one, to be perfectly honest, I could watch Rafael Nadal practice, I could watch him in the player’s lounge … the man is so intense. He is so focused and has so much purpose and drive that he’s truly such an overachiever because he doesn’t have the biggest guns and he doesn’t have the most talent. This is all self-made. He’s like one of those self-made millionaires. He came from nothing really. He plays with his opposite hand. He’s not left-handed, he’s right-handed. He’s not a hard court player, but he became one. He’s not a grass court player, but he became one. He has evolved. Many players get to a point and it becomes too hard and they don’t evolve. They just kind of sit in the same spot. They drop and they come back, but Nadal continues to get better. His new challenge is Djokovic, truly is, another kind of chapter in his life where he’s going to figure it out, it may be the next tournament, it may be next year, I don’t know, but the guy is not going away, and I have so much respect for that type of attitude.

Which match were you at your very best: In 1996 against Agassi … playing him in Memphis. I played completely out of my mind. Playing that good should have been illegal … I should have been arrested after that match. I had to play a certain way against him … I couldn’t play any other way. It was all-out, two first serves, there was no second serve. Nothing under 100 miles an hour. It was as hard as I could hit … every single point and everything went in. It was one match, one time the stars were aligned and it was a Supernova time. I was just so on Cloud Nine. I’ve seen it on video since then a bunch of times. I still cannot believe that person who won that match is actually me!


Scoop Malinowski
Author

Scoop Malinowski's latest double book Facing Serena Williams/Facing Steffi Graf is available at www.lulu.com. He also authored Facing Federer, Facing Nadal, Facing McEnroe, Facing Sampras, Facing Hewitt and Facing Marat Safin.

 

Centercourt
Oneononedoubles banner art resize

March/April 2024 Digital Edition