Before Dawn to Division I: St. Louis native Nia Cooper’s rise as a role model
I don’t know if you can recall what you were doing at 4 a.m. on a typical weekday when you were in middle school or high school. I can guarantee I wasn’t waking up at that time to go play tennis.
That’s not the case for St. Louis native Nia Cooper, who woke up well before dawn every morning so she could get time on the tennis court before she headed to school.
It takes extra effort to become a role model.
Cooper is now a junior on the NCAA Division I University of Illinois-Chicago women’s tennis team, where she is a trendsetter for young Black girls. She’s quite proud of that.
“I think it’s really cool,” she said. “I feel like a role model, in the sense that little Black girls can look up and see a girl doing it at the highest level collegiately. I want to make sure that I emphasize that there aren’t many of us, and that we’re trying to get more.”
Finding Tennis Early
She learned to play tennis as a child at Net Rushers, a Community Tennis Association designed to introduce tennis to youth in a diverse environment. Her father, who played basketball internationally after college, passed along his athletic genes to her. Her hand-eye coordination was good, and her parents encouraged her to pursue tennis.
It clicked for her quickly and she was a Net Rushers standout, but she still said her early career was “a little rocky.”
Cooper grew up in the St. Louis suburb of Chesterfield, Mo. She played one year of high school tennis at MICDS (Mary Institute and Saint Louis Country Day School). She also played at many of the local clubs, including Frontenac and Sunset in the afternoons.
But while most of her friends were watching television or playing video games, Cooper was getting her homework done early so she could get to bed. That alarm came early.
“That was the easiest time for me to get court time by myself,” she said. “The camps and clinics and all that stuff was in the afternoon, which was nice. But if you wanted one-on-one time, you basically had to do it before school.”
She credited her coach, LD Jones, who not only introduced her to tennis, but also was willing to get up early himself to provide her with that training.
“I was OK,” Cooper said of her junior career. “I was very dedicated. I would be out there more so fighting than being a good tennis player. I had a lot of good wins, though. I had a couple of wins over girls who are still playing in college.”
Nia Cooper was a standout within the Net Rushers CTA and at USTA St. Louis junior tournaments. Nia Cooper, University of Illinois-Chicago women’s tennis player, competed for the Net Rushers CTA and at MICDS in St. Louis. Now a D-I tennis player, Nia Cooper hopes to inspire young Black girls that it’s their time to reach higher. After a strong sophomore season at the University of Illinois-Chicago, Nia Cooper is prepping for an encore this spring.
College Success, Bigger Purpose
She played her first year collegiately at Chicago State University, where her team won its conference title and advanced to the national tournament. The Cougars did not advance past the first round, losing to Michigan.
“When you win your conference, you get put in the tournament with the big dogs,” she said.
The next year she transferred to UIC, where her team won the conference title again before facing Notre Dame in the NCAA tournament. Cooper lost only one singles match the entire regular season and actually took a set in her match against Notre Dame.
She believes the Flames have a good chance to repeat this year. While she’s accomplished a lot individually, she enjoys the team aspect of playing college tennis.
Eventually, that team aspect will come to an end. Then she’ll have to decide the next step of her tennis career. Does she want to play professionally? Does she want to coach? Those are possibilities.
Mostly, she wants to inspire Black girls to pursue tennis and be a role model for girls who look like her. There certainly are several Black females who have excelled in tennis. Cooper is excited to demonstrate that you don’t have to be a Serena or Venus Williams or a Coco Gauff to be considered a successful tennis player.
“When you look at Venus and Serena, you’re like, ‘Wow, it just seems so unattainable,’” Cooper said. “People are giving up because they’re not going to reach the level of Serena or Coco. But as a two-time conference champion, I feel extremely successful, and I’m still growing as a tennis player.
“It’s a series of stepping stones. You want to see people at every level. You want to see more kids that look like me in juniors. That makes college seem more achievable, and that makes the pro tour more achievable.”
Maybe it is worth getting up before the crack of dawn.
“It’s a series of stepping stones. You want to see people at every level. You want to see more kids that look like me in juniors. That makes college seem more achievable, and that makes the pro tour more achievable.”
Maybe it is worth getting up before the crack of dawn.