Eric Keppeler '85
Sports Writer
For a few years now, the St. Joe’s tennis team has been stuck in No Man’s Land – good enough to beat the weaker teams in the Monsignor Martin Athletic Association, but not quite good enough to play with the penthouse squads.
Case in point: The Marauders went 4-4 in 2025, beating St. Francis and Park twice and falling to Canisius and Nichols twice.
But first year St. Joe’s coach Jesse Brodka thinks his team might take a step forward this year.
“We always play our best, every time,” said Brodka, a 2017 St. Joe’s grad who was a member of the last Marauder tennis team that beat Canisius in 2015. “We’d love to beat Canisius or Nichols because we haven’t won against them in a long time. Our guys are athletic and they’re fighters, and if we could take a match against one of them, it would be awesome.”
Brodka, who’s the school’s Director of Mission and Ministry, steps in for the departed Frank Coheley as the program’s head coach. The Marauder tennis program had struggled mightily with numbers coming off of COVID, although Coheley was eventually able to drum up enough interest and field a competitive team, and that’s one of the reasons for the optimism this season.
“We’ve got some pretty good numbers this year and that’s the sign of a strong sport,” Brodka said. “Last year was really the first year with a big roster, and I inherited that from Frank. He did a great job of building the program by inviting as many students to join as he could. It’s a sport that anyone can play, but some of these guys turned out to be pretty good. The team was very young last year, and now we’ve got a lot of returning players.”
The format for competition changed last year in the MMAA from three singles and two doubles to two singles and three doubles, in order to get one more athlete into the starting lineup.
The Marauders welcome back sophomore Ryan Kneer, who will play first singles this season. Likewise, junior Charlie Voelkl at second singles.
The first doubles team is also settled with seniors Evan Attea and Andrew Rizzo.
The remaining two doubles teams will be manned by some combination of freshman twins Jack and Trevor Kotas and sophomores Connor Murray and August Young.
Now with a roster of 16 players and room to start only half of them, the trick is to find ways to keep everyone happy.
Fortunately, Brodka said, they play a lot of other teams that also have large numbers, and the play exhibition matches so everyone is involved; they’re very competitive, he said, as it allows players to track their performances and determine a pecking order for who can step into the starting lineup if needed.
“They’re all great teammates and they do a great job of supporting each other,” Brodka said. “Especially our seniors, who really show the younger guys what it means and be a St. Joe’s athlete and play with integrity.”