Junior Luba Schifris was born in Russia, raised in Germany and is earning her bachelor’s degree in marketing in the United States.

The quad-lingual is an honor student with a 3.24 GPA. She plans to work in marketing for a year before studying for her master’s.

Schifris hails from Blieskastel, a town of about 23,000 in southwestern Germany, and found her way to Sacramento by playing tennis.

“I grew up there but I was born in Moscow and after seven years we moved to Germany,” Schifris said.

Coming from a small town has never stopped Schifris from accomplishing big things, which is proven by her accomplishments.

She’s won international tournaments such as the Lorraine championship and the Saarland championship.

Traveling as often as every week for tennis when she was a child gave Schifris a respect for new places.

“Traveling is nice because there’s always something new unless it’s someplace like Montana or Arizona – then no,” Schifris said.

The Lorraine championship was in France where she competed several times a year while playing in the German Oberliga for club tennis.

“Every time you go (to France) they think you have to know French,” Schifris said.

Her tennis prowess runs in the family, as her mother played competitively in Russia. Schifris learned Russian growing up in Moscow before moving to Blieskastel.

“Basically, I speak Russian because I talked to my parents in Russian and when I moved to Germany, I just learned to speak German,” Schifris said.

She learned to speak English in school and obviously learned most of her French from her tennis friends in France, who practically demanded it, apparently.

Sacramento State’s men’s tennis coach Slava Konikov knew Schifris’ mother and worked with Director of Tennis Bill Campbell to recruit her.

“She’s got a great work ethic. She works very hard and I’ve always been impressed by that,” Campbell said.

Schifris uses her powerful serve to jump on opponents early and is known for having a strong all-around game.

She was named first team all-Big Sky Conference her two previous seasons and her record from her freshman and sophomore seasons combined was 24-17 in singles.

This season, Schifris is 9-5 so far in singles play, mostly competing in the No. 3 and No. 4 spots.

“She’s got a very good all-around game. Good footwork and a good serve. She hits the ball hard and deep, particularly on her forehand with quite a bit of spin on it,” Campbell said.

She is co-captain with fellow junior Joyce Martinez Gutierrez. They emerged as leaders when they were only freshmen, which is why Campbell named them as captains.

“By myself it would be different ? but with (Martinez Gutierrez) it’s nice,” Schifris said. “Now we’re both juniors and have experience to help younger players on the team like freshmen and sophomores.

Schifris and Gutierrez can often be heard riling up the team as they compete on separate courts by shouting their teammates’ names.

“It’s been great working with her,” Martinez Gutierrez said. “She always works really hard.”

Schifris shows lots of passion on the court like when she missed a shot against Weber State. She always pushes herself to be the best she can.

While she is very intense on the court, she is quick to smile and have conversations off the court.

“She’s always willing to laugh and smile. She’s a very pleasant person,” Campbell said.

Martinez Gutierrez likes to call Schifris “Luboj,” which is “Luba” in Russian. It is pronounced “LOO-BOFF.”

Schifris admires Kim Clijsters, a retired professional tennis player from Belgium. Schifris doesn’t exactly model her game after Clijsters but draws inspiration from her effort on the court.

Schifris didn’t mention whether she traveled to Belgium but it’s definitely in the realm of possibility for someone as cultured as her.

To improve her game she prefers practicing doubles and her serve. Campbell thinks her serve is potentially an elite one in the NCAA.

“As she continues to improve her second serve, which is getting better, she’ll have one of the best serves in college tennis,” Campbell said.

Schifris is modest about her serve and wants to continue to improve it going into her senior year next season.

She is one of potentially four seniors next year unless some of the women are redshirted for the season.

Cameron Ross can be reached at [email protected]