St. Rudolph
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St. Rudolph (私立聖ルドルフ学院中学校?) is a school in the popular anime/manga series, Prince of Tennis. They first appear in the Tokyo Prefectural Tournament Arc and face Seishun in the quarterfinals. The school itself only recruits students who are gifted at tennis and they only practice together once a week.
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[edit] Team Members
[edit] Yoshirou Akazawa (Captain)
(赤沢 吉郎 Akazawa Yoshirō?)
- Akazawa is first seen playing in Doubles one with Kaneda against the Golden Pair Oishi-Kikumaru. He is the captain of the team and, along with Kaneda, is one of the few persons who were originally on the team and wasn't brought in by Mizuki. Although Akazawa is initially bad at Doubles, and even hits Kaneda, he calms down and learns from him. In St. Rudolph's losses to Seigaku and Hyotei Academy, the Akazawa/Kaneda pair provide their lone victories. His only weapon is a backhand, where the ball hits the top of the racket instead of the sweet spot. This causes rapid movement of the ball, which makes it appear, to a select number of people with exceptional talents for seeing moving objects, as a mass of balls. As he executes the shot, he says "Kimi Teru", which is what the shot is called.
- In the previous year, Akazawa managed to defeat a Seigaku player, who has since graduated, in Singles.
[edit] Takuya Nomura (Vice-Captain)
(野村 拓也 Nomura Takuya?)
- Nothing is really known about him, except for the fact that he is constantly hit by Yuta for calling him Fuji Shuusuke's little brother. He is also known to be the weakest player on the team based on the lineup that Mizuki created, though he brags otherwise as seen in the fanbook. (All the strongest played in the first matches while he was the last.)
[edit] Hajime Mizuki (Manager)
(観月 はじめ Mizuki Hajime?)
- Unlike Akazawa and Kaneda, Mizuki Hajime is not an original member of the tennis team. But once he had transferred to the school, he began to scout and recruit talented players from around the country to join the tennis team in hopes of creating a team that would be "elite". Though he seems to work "behind the scenes" a majority of the time when we first meet him, he is actually a brilliant tennis player who can form scenarios of entire matches - including what the ending scores will be. He first observes his opponents, and then decides which of his own players would be most advantageous against the opponent and drills them in shots that will help them defeat the opponent's weakness. Like Inui and Yanagi, the ultimate source of Mizuki's pride is data tennis, but it is also the ultimate source of his weakness.
- Mizuki's arrogance and pride is boundless, leading him as far as to teach his pupil Yuta Fuji the dangerous Twist Spin Shot without informing him of the damage it could do to an arm that has not fully matured yet - never mind the fact that Yuta would possibly never be able to play tennis again. He also mistakenly believed that he had collected all of the data on Shusuke Fuji, not realizing that Fuji almost never plays to his full extent. He was led through the entire match believing that he was winning when in fact, Fuji had lost the first five matches intentionally, leading Mizuki to suffer a humiliating defeat. This defeat serves as a rude awakening for Mizuki in the anime, but in the manga he continues to display the same attitude as before despite the loss - though he does comfort Yuta when he is upset about Fuji's loss to Shitenhōji in the semi-finals match of the Nationals. Mizuki comically likes to note that he is Fuji's destined rival even though Fuji is a far better tennis player.
- Mizuki is sometimes found spying on Seigaku with Yuta and giving little 'lessons' to his "disciple" (Yuta). He has frequently made attempts to convince Kaoru Kaidoh to transfer to St. Rudolph, but has not been successful. Mizuki also seems to have a crush on Shusuke's and Yuta's elder sister Yumiko.
[edit] Yuta Fuji
(不二 裕太 Fuji Yūta?)
- Yuta is Shusuke Fuji's little brother. After getting annoyed at people always referring to him as Fuji Shusuke's brother, he left Seigaku. Soon he was scouted by St. Rudolph. His main shots are the Rising Shot, which hits the ball on the rise. By doing so, he can make the ball go faster, giving his opponent less time to react. His other is the Twist Spin Shot, which puts a topspin on the ball, causing it to bounce upwards with the same effect as Ryoma's twist serve. Yuta's nickname is the Lefty-Killer, because of the angles he can hit the balls at. He then loses to Hyotei's Akutagawa Jiroh, which kicks them out of fifth place. After the match with Seigaku, Yuta is able to let go of his jealousy and starts re-building his brotherly bonds with Shusuke.
[edit] Shinya Yanagisawa
(柳沢 慎也 Yanagisawa Shinya?)
- Not much is known about Yanagisawa, except that he has much loyalty to Mizuki and seems to be a good friend of his partner, Atsushi. He is often called a duck, because of his appearance and he ends the majority of his sentences with the word "dane" (what Disney's Donald Duck says in Japanese dubs) but in English he says "sure enough". During the match against Seishun Academy he and Atsushi team up against Kaidoh and Momoshiro. The match ends when Yanagisawa is accidentally hit in the face with Momoshiro's dunk smash. This incident was mistakened as the Dunk Smash actually killing someone although Yanagisawa is alive and well.
[edit] Atsushi Kisarazu
(木更津 淳 Kisarazu Atsushi?)
- Atsushi is a player who actually enjoys playing tennis. He is a gifted player who wants to get the best out of games. Typically he sports a long red headband. His twin brother goes to Rokkaku, a later opponent of Seigaku. Atsushi's only real shot is a drop volley, which he fakes as a Jumping Smash.
- Atsushi was originally a student at Rokkaku, but Mizuki mistakenly recruited him instead of his twin brother Ryou. In his anger, Mizuki forced Atsushi to cut his long hair and wear a headband to make sure he wouldn't be confused for his brother.
[edit] Ichirou Kaneda
(金田 一郎 Kaneda Ichirō?)
- We don't learn much about Kaneda, except for the fact that he is on the original team, and that he is a regular in his first year, much like Echizen Ryoma, the protagonist of the show. Kaneda has also been dubbed the 'tensai (prodigal) doubles player' for his talents. He is calm during matches and watches Akazawa's back as much as possible. He is well studied in tennis techniques. He's a soft-spoken boy who has a lot of respect for Akazawa, but he managed to stand up against him when Akazawa lost his cool during their doubles match against Oishi and Kikumaru; he called his partner "Bakazawa" (stupid Akazawa) in front of everyone and forced him to re-focus in the match.
[edit] Official Team Record
D2-Momoshiro Takeshi/Kaoru Kaido v.s Shinya Yanagisawa/Atsushi Kisarazu. Seigaku Wins. 3-5. St. Rudolph forfeits because Shinya got hit by Momoshiro's "Dunk Smash."
D1-Eiji Kikumaru/Shuichiro Oishi v.s Yoshirou Akazawa/Ichirou Kaneda. St. Rudolph Wins. 6-7
S3-Ryoma Echizen v.s Yuta Fuji. Seigaku Wins. 6-4 (anime)/6-3 (manga)
S2-Shusuke Fuji v.s Hajime Mizuki. Seigaku Wins. 7-5
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