By Jim Hague
It may turn out to be the greatest recruiting job in the history of men’s college tennis. In fact, to be technical, Sebastian Narath basically recruited himself onto the men’s tennis team at Rutgers-Newark.
Narath was a fine tennis player at Raritan High School in central New Jersey, but he thought of himself as more of a volleyball player than a tennis standout.
When Narath decided to enroll at R-N this past fall, he had no aspirations at all to become a college athlete.
“It’s funny, but over the summer, I e-mailed the coach (Andres Bustani) and told him that I played tennis in high school,” Narath said. “But I never heard anything back from him. I really was going to try to play volleyball, because that’s my main sport. I didn’t know when the tryouts were, so I thought I missed my chance.”
Narath played club travel volleyball for one of New Jersey’s premier club volleyball programs, the Warren Six Pack, who made it all the way to the club volleyball nationals. Narath had a prior relationship with former R-N volleyball coach and coordinator Pedro Trevino, who is now the women’s volleyball coach at the neighboring New Jersey Institute of Technology.
“I didn’t show up for the tryouts,” said Narath, missing out on his opportunity to play volleyball at R-N.
So one day, Narath just happened to be speaking with his friend, Karla Pelaez-Ramirez, who plays for the R-N women’s tennis team.
“Karla told me that the men’s team was having an open court after one of their practices,” Narath said. “I didn’t think much of it.”
While Narath was there, he was introduced to Bustani by Pelaez-Ramirez.
“He just showed up at one of the practices and said he could play a little,” Bustani said. “So I had him hit a few with our guys.”
And just like that, Bustani had a new member of the team.
“I was pleasantly surprised,” Bustani said. “I wasn’t expecting much of it. I just said to myself, ‘Let’s see what he’s got.’ We had a few guys who wanted to basically walk on, but I didn’t realize how good Sebastian was.”
When practices began in earnest for the spring men’s tennis team, Narath thought he was just going to be a regular member of the squad.
“I was kind of nervous, because I didn’t know if I could do it,” Narath said. “I didn’t play tennis all summer, so I thought I might struggle.”
But as workouts progressed, it became more and more obvious to Bustani that he had found a diamond in the rough.
“After the first few practices, I felt like I was doing pretty well,” Narath said. “I had the mentality that I really wanted it and I just sort of grinded it out. It’s really a lot more mental than it is skill. It’s also about strategy, where to hit the ball, what my opponent might be thinking. I just had to stay straight and stay focused.”
The freshman was going to be inserted right away as the Scarlet Raiders’ No. 1 singles player and part of the No. 1 doubles team with junior Alan Yu.
“I knew that he had potential,” Bustani said. “I saw that potential almost right away. It was kind of a shock that he could actually play. I certainly didn’t expect him to play like that.”
So just like that, Bustani had his top performer all because Narath decided to give it a try.
“As soon as we started to get everything together, it was easy to see how well he fit in,” Bustani said. “He’s very coachable. He listens to everything we tell him. I just could tell that he was going to help us. Being a freshman, you can’t expect him to play at that level right away. You figure it takes time. But he really didn’t have a tough time adapting at all. It’s already showing. He’s settled in.”
Bustani likes the way Narath has become a solid addition to the Scarlet Raiders’ roster.
“He’s pretty outgoing,” Bustani said. “He gets along with everybody. He’s a really nice guy. He wants to learn and wants to listen. He’s been a really nice surprise and the good thing is that we hopefully have him for three more years. I definitely did not expect this, but you can expect the unexpected at Rutgers-Newark.”
“It’s been a lot of fun,” Narath said. “The guys on the team are pretty cool. We all get along well. They’re fun to be around.”
Narath plans on majoring in civil engineering at R-N. He was asked if he found it at all remarkable that he’s gone from a unrecruited unknown to the top tennis player.
“I never thought of it that way,” Narath said. “But when you put it that way, it really is amazing. I didn’t think I’d play well enough to get this chance right away. I still think there’s room for improvement, so I’m going to keep working at it.”
But for now, the volleyball career is on hold.
“That is, unless Rutgers-Newark gets a beach volleyball team,” Narath said. “Then that’s when I go back to volleyball.”
