Vignesh Gogineni goes from Mason Comets to Cincinnati Open

As a kid growing up in Mason, Vignesh Gogineni started coming to the Cincinnati Open when he was 6 years old. He watched the professionals, then later served as a hitting partner at the tournament and competed at the Lindner Family Tennis Center as a member of the Mason Comets.

Now, Gogineni will make his ATP debut on Tuesday, Aug. 11, when he takes the court at the Cincinnati Open as a hometown wild card in qualifying. He enters the tournament ranked No. 975 in the ATP, just days removed from winning his first professional title at the Edwardsville Futures tournament in Illinois, and will face Otto Virtanen (ATP No. 114) in the opener.

It's the latest and most surreal step in a tennis journey that only became a professional pursuit this year.

"This is where I fell in love with the sport," Gogineni said.

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Gogineni grew up playing soccer, basketball, baseball and swimming before deciding tennis was the best fit. He went on to play three years of high school tennis (COVID wiped out his sophomore year), helping lead Mason to a pair of state team titles . But his most memorable moment came as a senior, when he won the individual state singles championship at the Lindner Family Tennis Center, the very facility where he will now take the court as a professional.

“I’m sure in the next couple of days it’s gonna be very amazing being on the other side of things. I’m super excited for everything," Gogineni said. "I can’t wait to get started.”

After high school, Gogineni played at Yale, where he developed into one of the Ivy League's top players. As a senior, he played No. 1 singles and earned first-team All-Ivy League honors in both singles and doubles. He compiled a 28-8 record in singles and helped Yale reach the NCAA Tournament for the first time since 1977.

During his junior year with the Bulldogs, Gogineni broke his wrist and missed almost the entire season. While recovering, he received an email informing him that he had been accepted into an ITF tournament in Louisville (M25), an event he had applied to play in but had slipped his mind after the injury.

One month after recovering, Gogineni was off to Louisville and reached the semifinals of his first professional event. He waited nearly three months until his next one, reaching another M25 semifinal in East Lansing.

"That made me realize that if I can do that coming off a wrist injury, I have a lot more potential in this game than I first thought," he said.

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That was when the tennis dream was put into motion. It led to a strong senior season, then a month in California post-graduation playing in the SoCal Pro Series , where he got a glimpse of life on the professional circuit.

"I wanted to get exposure to what a pro schedule would be like for a month or a month and a half," Gogineni said.

When he came home, Gogineni was back at the Lindner Family Tennis Center helping a former coach with a youth clinic this summer. That's when he saw Cincinnati Open Tournament Director Bob Moran and owner Ben Navarro and formally requested a wild card to the event for some time down the road. He was told they would keep in touch.

"We said, 'why not now?' It makes a difference to us when people take it personally," Moran said. "This is a career he wants to make. He's been playing in what we'll call the Challenger side of things across the country and is really trying to make his way. To be able to come home and compete in (qualifying) is great."

Two weeks later, while playing in a tournament in Champaign, Illinois, Gogineni received the call that he'd play in his hometown tournament.

"It was one of the best calls that I've ever gotten in my entire life," Gogineni said. "To share that moment with my family, that phone call was unbelievable."

There will be plenty more sharing on Tuesday, when family and friends will fill the stands. Gogineni's college coach is flying in to sit in his box. The nerves will be real, and Gogineni knows he's stepping onto the court against a player with significantly more professional experience.

"Leaving the court with no regret," Gogineni said when asked about the goal this week. "I don't care if I lose 6-0, 6-0 or 7-6 in the third set. Knowing that I went onto the court and I performed well, I fought well, I competed hard and I had a proper attitude and lose with class, I can keep my respect on the court."

For a rookie who once sat in these stands watching the world's best tennis players, that's enough. He'll get to find out what it feels like at the ATP-1000 level, where the competition will be fierce and emotions will be at an all-time homecoming high.

"It's definitely going to be nerve-wracking, but I'm also going to be very optimistic, very happy and just proud that I was able to achieve this," Gogineni said. "I'm not gonna let that stop me from performing my best on the court."

This article originally appeared on Cincinnati Enquirer: Vignesh Gogineni goes from Mason Comets to Cincinnati Open

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