Samantha Mannix has always had plenty of competition.

Growing up, Mannix often played games against her siblings. Given her competitiveness, it wasn’t a question of whether she would return for her fifth season on the Iowa women’s tennis team.

Fueled by her ambition and natural leadership qualities, Mannix is looking forward to the upcoming season. Hoping to be a source of positivity for the team, she approaches tennis with a flexible, goal-oriented mindset rooted in her desire to succeed.

“I just love to win, love to compete,” Mannix said. “Especially at the college level, winning is so much more fun because you’re contributing to a team atmosphere, and that is something that you don’t get to do at any other level of tennis.”

Teamwork has not always been familiar to Mannix. While she did play on her high school team a few months out of the year, Mannix said she mostly represented herself on the court. Making the transition to college required a shift in attitude.

“I’ve had to learn to put my emotions aside and do what was the best for the team and not just myself,” Mannix said. “There are times when I could lose my individual match, but the team ends up winning, so you have to embrace the team win and just work on your individual things to hopefully contribute to the win next week.”

Mannix also acclimated to new conditions during the height of the COVID-19 pandemic, which occurred prior to her junior year.

Void of human competition, Mannix focused on individual aspects of the game.

“I worked a lot on my backhand, and some other respects like serving at targets,” Mannix said. “I didn’t have a lot of competition, so it was a lot of mental skills off-court, some footwork on-court, some adjustments to certain strokes. For the most part, it was trying to find the joy in not competing and just working on the things that I could control.”

After compiling a 4-1 singles record during the fall of 2021, Mannix went 9-10 overall in singles in the spring of 2022.

“I think how I handle adversity is to just find the small tangible things that we can fix at the moment and then move forward and set goals,” Mannix said. “It doesn’t help to have a negative attitude; I learned that the hard way. I think working with others, trying to find the positives, and just finding the small things at once to work on so you eventually reach your goals.”

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Mannix said she was a natural leader during her time in Iowa City.

“I’ve always been pretty outspoken, and I enjoy being around people,” Mannix said. “I like to motivate others and to put a smile on people’s faces, so I think that naturally helps me be in a leadership role.”

Mannix said her favorite part of tennis is studying not only her opponent but her own game as well.

“Technically it’s very detailed and strategic; I just really like the idea of solving a puzzle during matches and figuring out how to beat my opponent while also sticking with my own game plan,” Mannix said.

After four seasons as a Hawkeye, Mannix isn’t ready to head out into the sunset just yet. While she said she wants to become a college tennis coach, a tennis tournament director, or an agent, competing remains her top priority.

“After having a tough year last year, it is really motivational to turn the program around and get to where we were going originally,” Mannix said. “I still love to compete. I still love to play.”