While most professional tennis players are enjoying their offseason, the world’s best juniors are gearing up for the most critical stage of their tournament schedules. With prestigious international events like the Eddie Herr International Junior Tennis Championships and the Orange Bowl taking place in December followed by the USTA Winter Nationals, this month is an opportunity to place an exclamation point on the 2013 season.

The team at the Junior Tennis Champions Center (JTCC) in College Park, Maryland, knows a thing or two about preparing junior players for the grand finale. Under the leadership of CEO Ray Benton and Senior Tennis Director Vesa Ponkka, the state-of-the-art tennis training and education center for youth ages 5-18 has gone from 40 students in 1999 to approximately 160 today. Around 50 of those athletes are in the full-time tennis and academic program. Thanks to the impressive growth, the USTA named the JTCC as its first Regional Training Center.

Despite the academy’s success, the JTCC remains focused on quality over quantity. It had 31 players in the Eddie Herr main and qualifying draws and a whopping 46 in the upcoming Orange Bowl. This past summer, they had 46 players in the Clay Court Championships and 52 players in the Hard Court Championships – more than any other USTA Regional Training Center in the nation. Perhaps most impressively, they’ve had 17 players in their system who have either won a national title or achieved a No. 1 national ranking in the past five years, boasting Denis Kudla and former world No. 2 Vera Zvonareva among their students. Further increasing their national profile, Fila inked a multi-year agreement with the JTCC in October to promote the company’s performance tennis apparel and gear.

As a nonprofit organization, the facility is funded by a combination of tuition payments, earnings from the annual gala, their US Open ticket campaign and foundation grants. While it’s easy to think about successful tennis academies as money-making machines, the JTCC has a healthy focus on giving back. They provided over $800,000 in financial aid this year alone, and have successfully launched a community outreach program focused on local grassroots tennis growth.

At the conclusion of the Eddie Herr, JTCC walked away with Boys’ 18s and Girls’ 14s quarterfinalists, a Boys’ 14s semifinalist and a Boys’ 14s finalist – not bad considering the tournament plays host to the best players from around the world. Molding mini champions is a nice bonus for the coaches at the JTCC, but they are very clear about the fact that their aim is to produce a well-rounded athlete prepared for life off the court.

“I’m coming from [Finland] where nothing is given to you,” Ponkka has said about his coaching philosophy. “You earn it. You don’t get a trophy just to show up. And what we try to do here is stick to those core principles: working hard, no excuses. You have to earn what you get. No whining and crying. Yes, it is a shock to some kids. We deal with it with patience. Patience is the difference.”

That patience and persistence has paid dividends. Every single JTCC graduate has gone on to a professional or college tennis career. So it’s no surprise that up-and-coming players come from all over the world come to train in the unlikely tennis hub of College Park, Maryland. With the Orange Bowl around the corner, look for players from the Junior Tennis Champions Center to be a major factor in the final outcome.