Gough overcomes woes in climb to No. 1 at Glass

If E.C. Glass senior Caroline Gough handles adversity better than most girls her age, it’s because she’s been through plenty of it.
Gough returns as the No. 1 singles seed on the Hilltoppers’ tennis team despite dealing with a stress fracture in her left foot that sidelined her for the postseason last spring before having surgery on her right knee over the summer.
But those injuries seem trivial compared to the emotional distress she experienced the year before she enrolled at Glass. Her father, Frank Gough, died of a heart attack that year and she was the one who discovered him.
She is playing in memory of her father, carrying on the legacy left at Glass by her older sister Abbie and brother Ross, who played on the Hilltoppers’ three-time defending Group AAA state championship boys teams from 1998 through 2000.
“He’d love to be out there watching me play tennis,” Gough said of her dad. “He would never miss a match.”
“He was always here and was very supportive,” Glass coach Jill Murray added. “It was a big shock.”
His traumatic death inspired Gough to join the Boonsboro volunteer rescue squad as an EMT and volunteer in the emergency room at Lynchburg General Hospital. She plans to enter the medical field after attending James Madison University starting this fall.
“I want to be a nurse and eventually a paramedic,” Gough said. “I definitely want to do something like emergency medicine.”
She has put some of the things she’s learned to practice in an athletic trainer capacity this season, helping teammates by wrapping their wrists and ankles.
Dressing their injuries may help her take her mind off her own.
So far, the lateral release arthroscopy she had on her knee hasn’t hampered her as much as the budding stress fracture in her foot, which required her to wear a protective boot at the end of last season.
“Jill (Murray) and I are working to try to make it so I finish out my season, maybe if that means not playing all the matches,” Gough said. “Hopefully, this year, I’ll be able to be healthy the entire season and give it my all, to finish strong. I just have to know when to stop and when to go.”
She has changed her match strategy in an attempt to finish points and opponents off faster.
“When she gets into a match, she really digs in,” Murray said. “She’ll do different things to change her game plan to do what she needs to do to win the match. She’s a smart player.”
A natural left-hander and ground-stroke player, Gough has relied on her booming backhand and solid forehand even more this spring, hitting passing shots and winners from the baseline rather than put a pounding on her feet by charging the net.
“Her ground strokes are her forte,” Murray said. “She puts good depth and direction on the ball. (And) she’s a lefty, so she’s got good spin on her serve, which sort of surprises people.”
“I try to find their weaknesses and try to hit it there in order to win those points,” Gough added. “I try to work hard, move my feet and attack. When the opportunity’s right, I do try to come in. I’m trying to get my net play to be a little better to finish … points more easily instead of running back and forth.”
Gough maintains a calm demeanor on the court that belies her fierce intensity.
“She handles pressure very well,” Murray said. “Her dad was a very competitive basketball player at Lynchburg College. She probably inherited her competitive drive from him.”
His passing hasn’t lessened her desire to succeed. If anything, it has given her more passion for the game, and ambition for the Hilltoppers.
“We are definitely going to go very far this season,” Gough said. “I’ve never been to state in my high school career, though we’ve gotten close. Hopefully this year, we’ll capitalize on that.”
She feels a healthy combination of support and pressure from her teammates this season.
“We’re a really tight-knit team,” Gough said. “We are very supportive of each other and are pretty deep on our ladder. It’s a very competitive team. It forces me to work even harder to maintain my position.”
She has yet to lose a best-of-three-set challenge match, “probably due to her heart and competitive drive,” Murray said. “She really wants to be out there and wants to compete, and she doesn’t complain.”
Her father’s premature death has helped Gough keep tennis in perspective.
“She’s very level-headed and even-keeled,” Murray said. “She doesn’t freak out in an emergency and she doesn’t panic (when she falls behind in a match). She takes it point by point and just plugs away.”
Her life has been enriched by the sport, which has helped bond her family together, and it has taught her plenty about life itself.
“I’ve definitely learned work ethic, to work hard and never give up,” said Gough, who started playing at the age of 5 and has taken lessons from Drew Robinson at Boonsboro Country Club. “I’ve played the game as long as I can remember. I really just like being on the court and I just love the game.”