{"id":495,"date":"2012-06-19T07:00:00","date_gmt":"2012-06-19T07:00:00","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/lbpost.com\/articles\/sports\/getting-to-know-jenny-hilt-costello-49er-tennis-coach\/"},"modified":"2012-06-19T07:00:00","modified_gmt":"2012-06-19T07:00:00","slug":"getting-to-know-jenny-hilt-costello-49er-tennis-coach","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/lbpost.com\/sports\/getting-to-know-jenny-hilt-costello-49er-tennis-coach","title":{"rendered":"Getting to Know Jenny Hilt-Costello, 49er Tennis Coach"},"content":{"rendered":"\n

Can you detail your coaching path to Long Beach State?<\/strong><\/p>\n

I played at UCLA and after graduation I was offered the assistant coaching position with Long Beach State. I worked as the assistant under Jami Jones for 2 years and then accepted an offer to be the assistant coach at the University of Washington. En route to Seattle, I got a call from Cindy Masner offering me the interim head coaching position because Jami decided to be a full time mom. I accepted and then one year later I was appointed the full-time head coaching position.<\/p>\n

Beyond winning a championship, what are your goals for the upcoming season?<\/strong><\/p>\n

Our goal is to improve everyday. We want to work on something each day that will make us better tomorrow. Regardless of whether our players win or lose a match, I want them to walk off the court having accomplished certain goals each day. That is the only way to improve and gain confidence for the next match.<\/p>\n

Who is an exciting new player we will see on you team next season?<\/strong><\/p>\n

‘Beach Tennis’ is about TEAM. It takes 4 points to win a match. It takes everyone to post a good season. We build a team environment working together and empowering each player to earn her spot in the line up. Having said that, we are going to have 4-5 new players on our roster next season, so we are looking for everyone to contribute and I think it will be a very exciting season.<\/p>\n

What is your recruiting philosophy?<\/strong><\/p>\n

We look for student-athletes who want to get their degree but are still looking for a challenge and to compete at a high level. To do that, the student-athletes have to be interested in putting in the time and the work to get there…..intensity. We want to recruit players who still love to play tennis!<\/p>\n

How important are the summer months to the development of your team?<\/strong><\/p>\n

The summer months provide an important opportunity for our players to get some well deserved time off. We have a very long season that runs from early September to mid-May. When the season ends, our players need to take some time off to rest and heal their bodies. But once they have taken a little time off, then we encourage them to train hard and play a few tournaments before they return to campus in the fall so that we can pick up where we left off in the spring.<\/p>\n

If someone asked you for a recommendation where to eat in the Long Beach area, where would you send them and what would you tell them to order?<\/strong><\/p>\n

I love Taco Surf. Their chips and salsa are great and I always order their Baja fish tacos with black beans on the side.<\/p>\n

Outside of coaching and sports, what are your hobbies?<\/strong><\/p>\n

Travel<\/p>\n

If you had a weekend off during the season and you weren’t allowed to work, what would you do with the free time?<\/strong><\/p>\n

I would take a long weekend away with my husband. Actually, I had a free weekend this past season for the first time in 15 years, so we went to New Orleans for the Final Four. It was so much fun!<\/p>\n

What vacation spot has been your favorite to visit?<\/strong><\/p>\n

I have been very fortunate to have traveled to some really spectacular places. It is hard for me to pick just one, so I am going to give you my top 3 vacations: Bora, Bora Tahiti is by far the most beautiful place I have ever been. My honeymoon in Jamaica was incredible and I highly recommend it!! Ya Man! I spent three weeks driving around France one summer and it was amazing; the food, the wine and each city\/village was so scenic. And everyone should visit Normandy. I am not a history person but Normandy blew my doors off and took my breath away!!<\/p>\n

Dodgers or Angels, and why? Lakers or Clippers, and why?<\/strong><\/p>\n

Dodgers, Lakers and the Kings…..the real LA teams (and my dachshund is named Dodger Dog).<\/p>\n

Excluding your team, what “49er Moment” from the 2011-12 season was your favorite?<\/strong><\/p>\n

I really enjoyed watching men’s basketball beat Pitt!! We were out at a local restaurant and everyone went nuts!<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

The Long Beach Post takes a second to speak with CSULB tennis coach, Jenny Hilt-Costello<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":33,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"newspack_sponsor_sponsorship_scope":"","newspack_sponsor_native_byline_display":"inherit","newspack_sponsor_native_category_display":"inherit","newspack_sponsor_underwriter_style":"inherit","newspack_sponsor_underwriter_placement":"inherit","inline_featured_image":false,"newspack_ads_suppress_ads":false,"newspack_popups_has_disabled_popups":"","_":"","_author_alias":"","cap-aim":"","cap-description":"","cap-display_name":"","cap-first_name":"","cap-jabber":"","cap-last_name":"","cap-linked_account":"","cap-newspack_employer":"","cap-newspack_job_title":"","cap-newspack_phone_number":"","cap-newspack_role":"","cap-user_email":"","cap-user_login":"","cap-website":"","cap-yahooim":"","newspack_article_summary":"","newspack_email_html":"","newspack_email_type":"","newspack_featured_image_position":"","newspack_hide_page_title":"","newspack_hide_updated_date":false,"newspack_post_subtitle":"","newspack_show_share_buttons":"","newspack_sponsor_byline_prefix":"","newspack_sponsor_disclaimer_override":"","newspack_sponsor_flag_override":"","newspack_sponsor_only_direct":"","newspack_sponsor_url":"","newspack_article_summary_title":"Overview:","newspack_show_updated_date":false,"footnotes":""},"categories":[3],"tags":[],"newspack_spnsrs_tax":[],"coauthors":[],"class_list":["post-495","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-sports","entry"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/lbpost.com\/sports\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/495","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/lbpost.com\/sports\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/lbpost.com\/sports\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/lbpost.com\/sports\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/33"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/lbpost.com\/sports\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=495"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/lbpost.com\/sports\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/495\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/lbpost.com\/sports\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=495"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/lbpost.com\/sports\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=495"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/lbpost.com\/sports\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=495"},{"taxonomy":"newspack_spnsrs_tax","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/lbpost.com\/sports\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/newspack_spnsrs_tax?post=495"},{"taxonomy":"author","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/lbpost.com\/sports\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/coauthors?post=495"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}