SKILLMAN, NJ – The Intercollegiate Tennis Association (ITA) announced today the 2013 inductees for the ITA Men’s Collegiate Tennis Hall of Fame. The 2013 class consists of seven inductees: Coaches – Bobby Bayliss (University of Notre Dame), Dennis Emery (University of Kentucky), and John Peterson (Tyler Junior College); Players – Paul Goldstein (Stanford University), Kelly Jones (Pepperdine University), and Harold Solomon (Rice University); and Contributor – Alan Schwartz (Yale University). The 2013 honorees will be inducted at the 2013 ITA Men’s Collegiate Hall of Fame Enshrinement Banquet, which will be held on Wednesday, May 22 at the I Hotel & Conference Center during the NCAA Division I Men’s and Women’s Tennis Championships at the University of Illinois in Champaign, IL. The ceremony is set to begin at 6 pm CT.
Coaches
Bobby Bayliss, head men’s coach at the University of Notre Dame, will be retiring at the end of this season, ending a 26 season stint at the helm of the Fighting Irish men’s tennis program. Entering his 44th season as a Division I head coach, Bayliss owns 746 career victories, the most by any active tennis coach in the nation which also places him sixth among all-time tennis coaches. He is a three-time ITA Midwest Region Coach of the Year and was honored in 1992 as the Wilson/ITA National Coach of the Year after guiding the Fighting Irish to the NCAA finals. Bayliss also helped the United States win a gold medal at the World University Games in Sheffield, England in 1991.
Dennis Emery was a men’s head coach at two institutions during his 35 year career, spending 30 of those years at the University of Kentucky. He finished his coaching career with 655 wins, 568 of those during his time with the Wildcats. Emery guided Kentucky to two SEC championships (1992, 2012), finished in the Top 25 of the final ITA National Men’s Rankings 23 times, and led the Wildcats to 11 Sweet 16 and four Elite Eight appearances. He also coached the NCAA Singles Finalists in 2000, 2002, and 2012. He was also honored as the SEC Coach of the Year on three occasions, the last coming in 2012. At the time of his retirement, Emery was the second winningest coach in SEC history.
John Peterson coached the men’s and women’s teams at Tyler Junior College from 1987 to 2011, finishing with an unprecedented 25 National Junior College Athletic Association (NJCAA) tennis championships. With 828 career wins, Peterson is already a member of both the NJCAA Men’s and Women’s Tennis Hall of Fame, the Texas Tennis Coaches Hall of Fame, and was named the Wilson/ITA Junior College National Coach of the Decade.
Players
Paul Goldstein, a 1998 graduate of Stanford University, helped guide the Cardinal to the NCAA Team Championship each of his four seasons from 1995-98. He was a four-time ITA All-American in doubles and an ITA All-American in singles. In 1998, Goldstein reached the NCAA singles final and was named the Pac-10 Player of the Year. He finished his collegiate career with 84 singles victories, fifth most in Stanford history, and three All-Pac-10 selections. Goldstein is an ITA/Rafael Osuna Sportsmanship Award winner and is a two-time recipient of the ITA/Arthur Ashe Jr. Award for Sportsmanship and Leadership.
Kelly Jones, a 1986 graduate of Pepperdine University, played for the Waves from 1983-86. Jones was a three-time ITA All-American in doubles, an ITA All-American singles, and claimed two NCAA Doubles Championships in 1984 and 1985. He also helped guide the Waves to an NCAA finals appearance in 1986. Jones went on to have an outstanding professional career, reaching the mixed doubles final of Wimbledon in 1988, the men’s doubles final of both the Australian and US Open in 1992, and reached the No. 1 spot in the ATP Doubles Rankings. He also claimed two ATP Tour Singles titles along with being a member of the 1984 US Olympic Team. Jones coached recent top Americans Mardy Fish, James Blake, and John Isner prior to accepting the men’s head coach position at Furman University.
Harold Solomon played at Rice University from 1971-72, earning ITA All-American honors before turning pro. During his time at Rice, Solomon led the Owls to back-to-back Southwest Conference team championships, while also claiming the 1971 Southwest Conference singles title. In his professional career, Solomon was ranked as high as No. 5 in the world, won a total of 22 singles titles, and reached the finals of the 1976 French Open as well as the semifinals of the 1977 US Open. He was also a member of two winning U.S. Davis Cup teams in 1972 and 1978. He would eventually go on to coach champion players Mary Jo Fernandez, Jim Courier, Jennifer Capriati, Monica Seles and Anna Kournikova, among others.
Contributor
Alan Schwartz, the former Chairman of the Board & President of the USTA, has played an integral role in developing the growth of tennis throughout the years, and has always been highly supportive of collegiate tennis and the ITA. He served two terms as the president of the National Indoor Tennis Association (NITA), from 1973-74 and again from 1978-79. Schwartz also co-founded the Midtown Tennis Club in Chicago, which is the largest indoor tennis club in the world. Since 2003, Schwartz has represented the USTA internationally through the International Tennis Federation (ITF) and is credited as the co-author of the National Tennis Ratings program. A three-year letterman of his varsity team at Yale, Schwartz served as the captain of the team during his senior year.
About the ITA Men’s Collegiate Tennis Hall of Fame
The ITA Men’s Collegiate Tennis Hall of Fame, housed at the University of Georgia’s Dan Magill Tennis Complex, was inaugurated in 1983 and has inducted more than 200 players, coaches and contributors. The ITA Hall of Fame museum displays over 2,000 rare photos and memorabilia. Its members include the late Arthur Ashe (UCLA), Jimmy Connors (UCLA), John McEnroe (Stanford) and Coach Dick Gould (Stanford). The ITA Women’s Collegiate Tennis Hall of Fame is located at the College of William & Mary in Williamsburg, Va. For a complete list of the Hall of Fame Inductees, please visit www.itatennis.com.
