St. Thomas More Tennis With Coach Jonathan Thie

Jonathan Thie is the Head Coach of the Men’s tennis team at St. Thomas More, a private Catholic high school in South Dakota.  He recently led the team to earning 12^th place at the South Dakota State Tournament.  The year before he took this position, Jonathan Thie was the Assistant Women’s Coach.  In 2011, he helped the women’s team earn 6^th place at the South Dakota State Tournament.

For Jonathan Thie, coaching tennis on a high school level has been a challenging, but invigorating, experience. Jonathan Thie had experience teaching children ages ten and under, as well as coaching a Junior Tennis team.  However, he had never coached high school prior to taking on these two coaching positions at St. Thomas More. 

Coaching high school students in tennis presented Jonathan Thie with some totally unique challenges that he had never faced before.  When tennis players reach high school age, some of them are at the level where they could potentially go professional.  Their physical condition and mental understanding of the game has finally reached a point where – talent and training provided – they could become professional tennis players.  Of course, the “talent and training provided” caveat is a critical one.  Nevertheless, it makes the significance of the coach’s role more important than ever.

Jonathan Thie loves this fact about his job as Head Coach at St. Thomas More.  He hasn’t turned any players pro yet, but he hopes that when the right set of players come along he’ll be able to take the team to being the very best in the state, and beyond!

Additionally, Jonathan Thie has been so successful with St. Thomas More because of his various forms of certification.  Thie is certified by the Professional Tennis Registry and the United States Professional Tennis Association as a “Certified Tennis Professional.”