French native Hureau finds new home in Bloomington leading IU tennis

IU sophomore Leslie Hureau dealt with something on Jan. 15 that she hadn’t experienced since last spring: losing a college tennis match.

The loss was far from an embarrassing result. It came at the hands of Georgia’s Chelsey Gullickson, the defending NCAA singles champion who considered going pro after last season. It was a 6-1, 2-6, 6-4 match and one that IU coach Lin Loring said Hureau had a great shot at winning in the third set.

“Right after the match, I was just really disappointed because I missed a couple of opportunities in the third set,” Hureau said. “But when I thought about it later, I was pretty happy. I wasn’t really sure about my tennis level, so it will help me know that I can go against anybody.”

The close defeat gave Hureau, currently ranked No. 91 in the Intercollegiate Tennis Association rankings, the confidence that she can compete with the elite players in college tennis.

Hureau has since won all her matches at No. 1 singles, giving her a 15-1 record since the fall season.

Loring said Hureau’s biggest weapon is her versatility.

“She’s got a good all-court game,” Loring said. “She is comfortable at the baseline, she’s comfortable at the net, has a nice serve. Her strength is really that she doesn’t have a weakness.”

But Hureau may have never played a college match if she didn’t make an important decision about her athletic career when she was 16.

Hureau’s parents were avid skiers and tennis players and got her involved in both sports around the age of 4. Hureau started skiing competitively at age 9 and soon became France’s top alpine skier in her age group.

She said she was particularly good at the giant and super giant slalom events but had to choose which sport to focus on as she approached college.

“Actually I think at that point I was better in skiing,” Hureau said. “It’s really a tough sport because you wake up really early and have to go outside in the cold. And if you want to go pro, you have to go through a lot. With tennis, I could go to college even though my level wasn’t as good. There were just a lot more opportunities with tennis.”

Apparently the balance and coordination required of Hureau to slalom ski doesn’t translate to the practice courts at IU. In addition to being the team’s top player, Hureau also joked that she’s its top klutz.

“I’m the one who falls all the time at practice,” Hureau said. “Coach always makes jokes about that because if there’s something in the middle of the court, I’m going to hit it and probably fall.”

Once she decided to pursue tennis, Hureau visited IU and three other Big Ten schools before deciding on the Hoosiers. She liked the campus and the friendliness of the players, she said.

It also didn’t hurt that she could relate to the other international players on IU’s roster, which currently has seven players from outside the United States.

“I went to Iowa, and I was the only foreigner, and they were like, ‘Oh, she’s coming from another planet,’ you know. So it just felt right to be here,” Hureau said.

Hureau said she spends time hanging out and watching soccer matches with the team’s other French players, freshman Sophie Garre and senior Myriam Sopel.

She also keeps in touch with her parents via Skype and will see them in person when they visit the first week of March.

“Last year we Skyped only once a week, but my mom calls me now every two days,” Hureau said. “I don’t know, I guess she misses me more this year.”

Hureau, who said she hopes to get a degree from the Kelley School of Business, doesn’t plan to play tennis professionally, but Loring said that could be an option for her if she gets physically stronger and stays injury-free.

Loring said Hureau is constantly improving and has made a big jump in her play since her freshman season, when she posted a 25-11 singles record and made the All-Big Ten team.

Loring said she is a “more mature player” and is getting more comfortable playing on hard courts rather than the clay courts that are popular in France.

Hureau’s main individual goal this season is to beat good players in order to improve on her No. 91 ranking. She’ll get her next chance to do that at 4 p.m. today at the IU Tennis Center against No. 6 Duke, whose lineup features No.  4 Reka Zsilinszka.