Libby Griggs started playing tennis at just nine years old. When she first began it was just something to do after school and when she was bored. “I remember wanting to get involved in tennis because I saw my sister playing and thought it would be really fun” said Griggs she recalled why she first began playing. 

Two years into her tennis career she had become a much more serious player and began to compete at a higher level. After having been invited to the United States Tennis Association’s national campus for being top 50 in her grade she made the decision with her parents to do school online in order to have more time to practice. “I needed a more flexible schedule so I could travel when I needed to play tournaments during the school year,”said Griggs.

Her motivation to play at such a serious level from a young age came from herself and her coaches. “In order to do good at anything you really have to love it and have fun with it, which I believe is why I was able to excel so quickly at tennis when I first started playing,” said Griggs. She credits her success in tennis from the time she started playing to the love she had for the sport. This combined with her determination led to her achieving her first national level three title at 13 years old. Ever since, she has continued to compete in junior USTA competitions around the country.

When asked about her goals for tennis, she made it clear that she would like to play in college if possible but never intended to even try to reach a professional level. “I think that I like tennis enough to possibly play for a team in college if that’s what I still want by my senior year, but I can’t imagine it being a career,” said Griggs. It can take a different level of discipline to try to reach such a high level, especially when it is still unclear whether a person would like to play college. 

A major setback took place at 15 years old when she injured her shoulder while playing, this caused her to be out of the sport for around a year. This devastated her, and it was hard to stay motivated to play, especially since the Covid-19 quarantine was happening around the same time. It can be so hard for a person to come back to anything with the same inspiration they once had for it after taking such a long amount of time off. That is what she managed to do.

Griggs made her comeback into the sport by going out for the high school tennis team in the spring of 2020. This re-sparked her interest in the sport and made it very enjoyable to be back into competing. “I liked the feeling of being on a team because I had never experienced it before, everything I had known about tennis was so individual so this was fun and new to me” said Griggs. Due to her enjoyment that came from playing for the tennis team both years, she plans on continuing to her senior year.