The LSU men’s tennis team was eliminated from the NCAA Tournament by Illinois this weekend, but after a pair of SEC Championships, two Final Fours and a Sweet 16 appearance, its obvious that LSU made the right choice with third-year head coach Jeff Brown.
by Joey Papania
LSUsports.net
A little over two and a half years ago the LSU tennis program rolled the dice and took a chance on a talented, yet inexperienced head coach in Jeff Brown. And that gamble has paid off.
In his first two seasons, Brown captured back-to-back SEC Championships and Final Four appearances, led the Tigers to only the second No. 1 ranking in school history to that point, and was named College Tennis Magazine’s National Coach of the Year in 1999.
This year he led the Tigers to a No. 10 ranking. The Tigers made their 6th straight appearance in the NCAA Championships, the 16th in the past 17 years. LSU held the No.1 ranking for three weeks earlier this year, despite finishing fourth in the SEC this season, only two games behind co-champions Florida and Tennessee.
Despite being knocked out of the NCAA Championships in the Sweet 16 by Illinois on Saturday, Brown has clearly continued and extended the continuity of this program.
Brown played his college tennis here at LSU. He was recruited and played under Hall of Fame coach Jerry Simmons. A native of Gainesville, Florida, some may wonder how he ended up in Baton Rouge.
“When I was coming out of high school, the University of Florida had not put much emphasis on their tennis program,” Brown explained. “Since I have been here, Florida has put a greater emphasis on the program, but at the time I was looking for a better tennis program. LSU had started a pretty good tradition since Coach Simmons arrived and put the program in the rankings. I also played basketball for two years combining that with tennis. LSU, Clemson, and Arizona were some of the only schools that saw past the fact that I wasn’t playing tennis full time. I fell in love with the school and the culture, so I hung around.”
In his four-year career at LSU, Brown became the Tiger’s third all-time winningest singles player. In his senior season, he was named to the All-SEC Singles and Doubles team, was an NCAA singles and doubles participant, and was named a Doubles All-American.
Brown spent the next five years on the pro tour. In 1991, he was a Volvo International Doubles Finalist and made it to the Australian Open Doubles and Wimbledon Doubles Round of 16.
“I truly value the training that I had as a player in LSU’s system and under Jerry Simmons,” Brown said. “As a professional I got a chance to see what made other people successful as well. I combined a lot of the knowledge I gained as a player. I also had a lot of my own ideas, but I kept everything I experienced in my life that was a benefit to better tennis and tried to put that into play. I also think I have a pretty good rapport with the players.”
From 1994-97, Brown was named as an assistant coach at LSU. Within that time, he developed a close bond with many of the players, largely in part to their closeness in age.
“I was aware that I was going to have to do something to differentiate my role as the head coach,” said Brown. “And I was friends with a lot of the guys, because we spent a good deal of time on the practice court hitting balls against each other. So the first day of practice, one of our player came into practice a little late. So I threw him out, not so much that I was mad at him, but I had to sort of send a message to let the guys know that just because their buddy is in charge they still had a job to do.”
That message was heard loud and clear. The Tigers reached the 20-win plateau for the third straight year this season, only the third time in school history that has been accomplished.
But it wasn’t quite the easy transition that many would think. When Simmons announced his retirement, many urged LSU Associate Athletic Director Debbie Corum to name Brown the successor without conducting a national search.
“I came under criticism at the time for not naming Jeff the coach immediately,” says Corum. “But I think it was the best thing for both of us to conduct a national search. Jeff was the best coach available for this job and has done everything I’ve asked and expected of him and I know he will continue to.
“The reason why it was important to do a national search is because he needed to be able to come in during the interview process and convey to me that he had a plan for the direction of this program. It helped him formulate a plan for the direction of this program and he was able to convince me that he was definitely the right person for this job.”
The rest, as they say, is history.
With all the success, the bar continues to be raised for coach Brown and the LSU tennis program. In only three seasons as a head coach, Brown has accomplished what most coaches wish to achieve in a lifetime. He has continuously answered the challenges and adversity placed before him and realizes that those challenges will continue throughout his career.
“With the way the NCAA is set up now with sixty-four teams there are more and more schools and more and more programs putting money into tennis,” said Brown. “When I played, there was basically us and Georgia, and sometimes Tennessee, that were difficult in the SEC. Now every match in the SEC is difficult. And in the NCAA it is spread out so that there are basically seventy-five real top teams that can beat you if you don’t go out there and play well. So what you do throughout the course of a season is to be consistent and do things well from an approach standpoint. Overall the percentages should fall in your favor to where you are winning enough of those close matches to get yourself in position for the titles.”