By: <IMG SRC="http://files.12thman.com/graphics/bylines/charean.png">  : Charean Williams '86, Special Contributor to 12thMan.com
Share:
The future for Patrick Kypson is this weekend: The Aggies will host the NCAA men's tennis first and second rounds at the George P Mitchell Tennis Center. His future beyond this season will have to wait until Kypson finishes his freshman year.
"We'll see," Kypson said. "Right now I'm just focused on the NCAAs. I think we have a real shot as a team to do some real damage there. I think everyone is on, we can even win the tournament. Same thing for me in singles. I have an opportunity to go there and go deep. Right now, those are my main focuses, and staying healthy and practicing well and all that good stuff."
Kypson considered forgoing college for the pro circuit a year ago. He could leave after only one season at Texas A&M. But first things first…
Kypson leads the Aggies against Lamar at 1 p.m. Friday following Arizona State and Baylor's match in the other half of the regional. The winner of the single-elimination tournament this weekend advances to the NCAA Team Championships in Winston-Salem, North Carolina, on May 18-22.
A&M is ranked fifth in the country, and Kypson earned the No. 5 overall seed in the NCAA singles tournament. It earned him All-America honors on top of All-SEC first-team and the conference's All-Freshman accolades.
It's what was expected of Kypson and the team after he became the first top-ranked men's tennis recruit ever to sign with A&M.
"It was huge boost in the arm for the team," A&M coach Steve Denton said. "We were going to be a good team, and obviously he helped us be even much better. He's a very good player in both singles and doubles, and we had never had a player ranked No. 1 in the country in the 12 years I've been here. For me personally, it was great I had the opportunity and the USTA trusted me and us enough to allow him to come, because he was one of the USTA's top players.
"There was obviously some thinking in turning pro and not going to college. He ended up making the decision with his family and USTA coaches that coming to Texas A&M would be a good fit for him."
Kypson and fellow freshmen Carlos Aguilar and Barnaby Smith have made themselves right at home in Aggieland. They are a combined 54-21 in singles, including Kypson's 15-7 mark.
"He's kind of a quiet kid but very likeable," Denton said of Kypson. "I think the guys on the team were excited to have him. They knew what level of player he was and that he'd fit in with our chemistry, along with our two other freshmen, Carlos Aguilar and Barnaby Smith. All three of them have just fit in really, really well with the team.
"With a smaller team like we have with eight or nine guys, the chemistry is so important, so I couldn't be happier with the way the guys have jelled together."
Kypson, a Raleigh, North Carolina, native, moved to Boca Raton, Florida, when he was only 12 to practice full time at the USTA Training Center. Living in a dorm, away from his family and in a non-traditional high school environment, never fazed Kypson.
Patrick Kypson competing in the Southern 12's
He "never once" thinks about missing his prom or Friday night football games. Tennis is his life and his love.
"I enjoyed it a lot because 20 feet from my dorm room was tennis courts," Kypson said. "I'd wake up with people hitting tennis balls in the morning. Some people maybe wouldn't like it, but it's right up my alley. It suited me well."
"As crazy as it sounds, I'd rather be going to bed at 9 and waking up at 7 to go on the tennis courts and hit tennis balls. As long as I'm doing that, I'm going to have no regrets."
Kypson had a decorated junior career. He won five USTA National Championships, including the 16-year-old national singles title, and two years later, the 18s draw. The latter secured him a spot in the U.S. Open main draw.
Kypson following his win at the 2017 USTA Boy's Championship
His victory in the 16s draw in Kalamazoo, Michigan, in 2015 came shortly after a near-death experience that kept him in the hospital 10 days.
Kypson reacts after clinching the 2015 USTA Boy's Championship.
Kypson's win at the 2015 USTA Boy's Championship came just two months after surgery.
Kypson was on his way to Guatemala, with a layover in Miami, for a tournament. Thirty minutes before the first leg of his trip, Kypson's stomach began aching. He spent most of the flight in the lavatory throwing up.
He immediately went to the emergency room in Miami, where, despite all the signs of an appendectomy, Kypson was told he didn't have appendicitis. Kyson's father is a heart surgeon and his mother a nurse practitioner.
By the time his mother reached Miami the following day and diagnosed Kypson herself, demanding more tests, Kypson's appendix had ruptured and was leaking. Doctors then neglected to give Kypson antibiotics and left him with a nasty infection.
Kypson earned a win in Kalamazoo shortly after a near-death experience in 2015.
"They butchered me pretty bad," said Kypson, who lost 16 pounds during his hospital stay. "After that, I was grateful to get back on the court."
Kypson is America's next great hope on a pro tour where John Isner, at No. 9, is the only U.S. player in the top 12 of the ATP World Tour Rankings. Kypson has the game, the personality and the maturity to give the U.S. a men's tennis player to root for.
Kypson making his US Open debut in 2017
When Kypson found out three years ago that Bill Kallenberg, a youth minister who freelances as a tennis photographer, needed heart surgery but didn't have health insurance, Kypson started a gofundme page. It quickly raised $72,000 of the $106,000 Kallenberg needed.
Kallenberg's surgery came two months before Kypson's.
"I asked him when he was in the hospital, 'Patrick, how can I be praying for you?'" said Kallenberg, a University of Georgia graduate who everyone in the tennis world knows. "You never know what kind of answer you're going to get from a 15-year-old. He said, 'Pray that I have wisdom in the decisions I make.' I mean, 15 year olds just don't think about wisdom and the fact that choices have consequences."
Kypson will face another decision when this season ends. He already has ranked as high as No. 672 in the ATP world rankings, and the pro tour is in his future.
No one at A&M, though, is looking ahead. The future is now.
"First and foremost, we're trying to take it one day at a time," Denton said. "We'll have those discussions obviously later. But it's been great to have him. However long it is, it's been a real positive for me personally and for the team."
