UC Santa Barbara used a tennis racket to pass the proverbial baton this week.
Marty Davis, who recently retired as the winningest men’s tennis coach in school history, made that exchange with his successor while including the keys to a new Gaucho home: the Arnhold Tennis Center.
“We’re leaving behind $4 million in endowments and a $5.2 million tennis facility,” he said. “I feel pretty good about where UCSB tennis is right now.”
New head coach Blake Muller, Davis’ former assistant, unlocked the gates to the new facility for the first workouts on Monday. Athletic director John McCutcheon experienced that milestone with a bird’s-eye view from his second-floor office in the UCSB Intercollegiate Athletics Building.
“I’m sitting here, watching the guys out there at practice,” he said. “It really came out well — we’re really pleased.
“These things always take a little bit longer than you would hope, but once it’s in you kind of forget all that. It’s going to be a great resource.”
The Arnhold Tennis Center is expected to make a major impact on recruiting for both the men’s and women’s programs. Each one is coming off a Big West Conference championship season last spring.
“I think it’s a game-changer,” Muller said. “Every kid that I’ve brought in so far, I can see the look in their eyes of how impressed they are with what we’ve built.”
Women’s coach Simon Thibodeau made nearly the same observation after holding his first practice Thursday.
“It’s a real game-changer for our team,” he said. “We now have a top Division 1 facility. It enhances our players’ experience, and allows us to recruit and compete with anyone in the country.”
Construction began last October after UCSB alumnus John Arnhold (Class of 1975) and his wife, Jody, made one of the largest donations ever to Gaucho athletics. Arnhold, a past board chairman of the International Tennis Hall of Fame, also serves as a volunteer assistant coach with the UCSB’s women’s team.
“He’s a real special guy,” McCutcheon said. “He’s been supportive of both programs financially and in other ways, and he does a lot for the university beyond athletics.”
The stadium has seating for 300 spectators plus an 1,860 square-foot team building, locker rooms, storage, team lounge and electronic scoreboard.
Six of the eight courts are new while two others were refurbished from the old complex that was built adjacent to Robertson Gym in the early 1960s.
“The architects did a great job of squeezing that facility into that footprint,” Davis said. “What a huge upgrade for us. The locker room is gorgeous. The team room looks right out to court No. 3.
“It’s going to be a great place for the kids to congregate and study and string rackets.”
The Gauchos had been playing their home matches at the Rec Center, a facility that had been built for the general student body. It offered little to the intercollegiate teams beyond the actual courts.
“We called ourselves, ‘The Boys from the Shed,’” said Muller, who served as Davis’ assistant for the last seven years. “All we’ve had there was the shed that Marty and some of the boys built with their own two hands back in the 2004 or 2005 season.
“We’ve come a long way. I just tell the guys, ‘Hey, you’re reaping the benefits from the hard work these other guys put in and in how well they’ve represented UCSB and the tennis team … You guys have a big responsibility living up to that legacy.’”
He said Davis himself has “had a massive impact on a lot of lives,” especially his own.
“The lives he has touched and the young men he mentored are truly where he has left his mark,” Muller said. “He challenged every player to work hard and leave the program better off than when they arrived; and after two-plus decades it is clear Marty has no doubt left the program in a far better position than when he stepped on campus.
“Personally, I want to thank Marty for his mentorship and, more important, his friendship over the past decade.”
The seeds for the Arnhold Tennis Center were sown during the Gauchos’ 18-7 season of 2018. They lost their NCAA Tournament opener to 10th-ranked USC at the Trojans’ Marx Stadium, 4-1, after having won four of the first sets in singles.
“We were pretty close to actually beating them,” Muller said. “John Arnhold went down to the match and said he wanted to create that same environment for us.”
A NEW MILLENNIUM: Davis, who was a three-time All-American at Cal and a top-50 player on the pro tour, had few resources when he took over as UCSB’s coach in the fall of 1999. There was no salary for an assistant coach and only enough funding for three scholarships (the NCAA allows for as many as 4.5).
He did have Simon Shen that season, however.
“Simon was really special,” Davis said. “He went undefeated in duel matches his senior year (30-3 overall) and was invited to the NCAAs. I named our Sportsmanship Award after him.
“They have all these ITA awards, and toward the end of his season, the coach at USC called and asked, ‘Which award would you like Simon Shen to win?’ He would end up getting the Arthur Ashe Leadership and Sportsmanship Award.”
Davis captured the first of his 13 Big West Conference championships in 2002 and was voted coach of the year 12 times. He won a school-record 278 matches during his 22 seasons as head coach.
“I think the high-water mark for us was Morgan Mays and Simon Freund winning the Southwest Regional Championships in doubles,” he said. “To win our region, you have to beat all the guys from USC and UCLA, Arizona and Arizona State, San Diego, Pepperdine … It’s a hell of a region.
“We now have the Morgan Mays Captain’s Award … Morgan Mays was truly special.”
Davis’ 2019 team, led by Nicolas Moreno de Alboran and Joseph Guillin, was perhaps his best. It won its NCAA Tournament opener against Texas Tech before falling to 12th-ranked Stanford.
“Nicolas was ranked as high as sixth in the country and was an All-American, and Joseph won the ITA Regionals in singles,” Davis said. “These last few years, we’ve had guys who could do that.”
Muller, he added, was a big reason for that. He made it easier for Davis to retire at age 62.
“Blake had been doing more and more of the work the last several years,” he said. “He recruited most of the recent guys … They were really coming to UCSB for Blake at this point. It seemed like it was time.
“There are a lot of us who retired during this period (of COVID-19), right? You have time to reflect and you have time to do some math. You don’t know how many good years you have left. That was part of it.
“Part of it, too, is that with the Arnhold Tennis Center, we’re now in position to elevate the program to another level. It’s obviously going to take a lot of energy, so maybe having someone a little bit younger like Blake is the right guy for the program now.”
Muller, 35, is a former Santa Barbara High (Class of 2005) and Stanford star.
“We’re really lucky — Blake is the perfect person to take over,” McCutcheon said. “We did go through the process and had other really qualified candidates. But at the end of the day, Blake was able to present his vision for the future of the program.
“His understanding of how things work here at UCSB and what we’re looking for made him the perfect choice. We’re excited about it, and I know he’s excited about it.”
IT’S MULLER TIME. Although it won’t be easy to replace the likes of Moreno and Guillin, both of whom are now having success on the pro tour, Muller has added some key new players to the Gaucho roster.
Two transfers — Phillip Jordan from South Carolina and Diego Castillo from Fresno State, as well as freshman recruit Gianluca Brunkow of Topanga — all figure to make immediate impacts.
Six All-Big West players return, led by No. 2 player Stefano Tsorotiotis. Also back are Victor Krustev, Pablo Masjuan, Joseph Rotheram, Alejandro Vedri and Kai Brady.
“This year, there’s going to be a lot more competition for the top spot,” Muller said. “I think there are a couple of guys on this squad who have the potential to do special things.
“There’s a lot of motivation among our guys to see who can step in and fill those shoes at the top.”
Muller has hired Garrett Patton to fill his shoes as assistant coach. Patton, a former assistant coach at Cal Poly, recently earned his master’s degree at Michigan while serving as an assistant coach for the Wolverines.
Patton played No. 1 singles at Boise State for his dad, UCSB alumnus Greg Patton (full disclosure, Greg is my brother), whose 808 career victories were the most of any active coach when he retired in 2018.
“Garrett has been great,” Muller said. “Obviously, as a coaching staff, you have a way you want to do things, and he’s done a great job of instilling those values.”
Two Gauchos — Tsorotiotis and Jordan — began play this week at the Battle in the Bay Classic in San Francisco.
UCSB will play host to its annual Gaucho Classic at the Arnhold Tennis Center on Oct. 8-10, although a grand opening for the new facility isn’t expected be held until the regular season begins in January.
NEW FACES FOR UCSB WOMEN: Thibodeau recently hired former North Carolina star Maggie Kane as his new assistant coach. Kane volunteered as an assistant coach at Charleston Southern before returning to Chapel Hill for the last two seasons as a volunteer assistant. UNC reached the NCAA Final Four last spring.
“She is a natural leader with a tremendous work ethic,” Thibodeau said.
Other new faces for the Gaucho women include several top recruits led by Philadelphia’s Amelia Honer, who recently won the U.S. 18-and-under Clay Court Championships. Freshmen Filippa Bruu-Syversen of New Jersey and Priscila Janikian of Brazil were also top-ranked juniors.
They were joined in this week’s workouts by five of last year’s top six players, led by Big West Player of the Year Shakhnoza Khatamova. She and Elizaveta Volodko are both currently ranked in the ITA Top 100, while Big West Freshman of the Year Camille Kiss has also returned.
Arnhold is also back to lend a hand in the house he helped build.
“Without the support and close friendship of the Arnhold family, none of this would be possible,” Thibodeau said.
— Noozhawk sports columnist Mark Patton is a longtime local sports writer. Contact him at sports@noozhawk.com. Follow Noozhawk Sports on Twitter: @NoozhawkSports. Connect with Noozhawk on Facebook. The opinions expressed are his own.