Syracuse Tennis Program History
The Syracuse women’s tennis program has experienced a great deal of success throughout its history. In 2008-09, the Orange will play the 34th varsity season with hopes that its success on the court will be celebrated by those who follow it.
The first student-athlete to receive a women’s athletic scholarship from Syracuse was Abbe Seldin. Seldin brought the need for such a scholarship to the attention of Chancellor Melvin Eggers in 1974. For the next three seasons, Seldin was SU’s top singles player, and played at No. 2 as a senior. After graduating, Seldin played professionally as part of the USPTA, and currently participates in a USTA league for the top mixed doubles team in the New York Metro area.
Seldin paved the way for the Orange student-athletes who followed, such as Orange Plus Hall of Famers Betsy Gottlieb, Stephanie Rice, Kathy Bradford Locke and Jana Strnadova-Bacova.
Gottlieb was Seldin’s teammate for two years. She quickly earned the top singles spot, and recorded 82 singles wins in her career. In 1977, she became the first Orange player to win a New York State Championship in singles. The captain of the 1980 squad, Gottlieb was named the Lucille Verhulst Sportswoman of the Year in 1979 and 1981.
Stephanie Rice is one of four Orange players in the elite 50/150 Club, and one of two of those members also in the Orange Plus Hall of Fame. Rice holds five Syracuse records, all in doubles and all with Amy Schiff. The pair recorded 89 doubles victories between 1983 and 1987. Rice was the first player to record 150 career victories, and she currently ranks fourth on the all-time list with 152 wins. Rice and Schiff won the BIG EAST Flight A doubles title three straight years: 1983, ‘84 and ‘85. The pair also won the Flight B doubles title at the BIG EAST meet in 1986. In 1983 and ‘84, Rice and Schiff qualified for the National Indoor Championships, placing them among the six Orange doubles teams ever to accomplish that feat. Rice was also successful in the classroom, and was named a BIG EAST Academic All-Star in 1986 and ‘87.
Bradford Locke was SU’s No. 1 singles player all four seasons of her career. She is SU’s only two-time winner of the BIG EAST Flight A singles title, a distinction she earned in 1986 and ‘87. In 1986, she won the BIG EAST Flight A doubles championship with Gillian Tippett. That year, she also became the first Orange student-athlete to qualify for the NCAA Tournament. In that match, she took Ann Hulbert of Trinity to a seventh game in the first set before losing the match, 7-6, 6-0. Bradford Locke ranks sixth on SU’s career wins list with 136, and was the Lucille Verhulst Sportswoman of the Year in 1989 and 1990. She received three academic distinctions in 1990, including the Orange Plus Scholar-Athlete of the Year award, the ECAC Distinguished Merit Award, and the BIG EAST Post-Graduate Scholarship Award.
Strnadova-Bacova became the first Orange student-athlete to earn All-America honors in tennis in 1994. She has the most wins in SU history with 202, and the most singles wins with 112. She competed in the NCAA Tournament three of her four years, and became one of the first SU players to win a match in that tournament. In 1994, she defeated Lucia Ludvigova of Texas, 6-3, 7-5, and paired with Erica O’Neill to defeat Janice Durden and Shannon King of Clemson, 6-3, 5-7, 6-2. That year, she advanced the farthest of any Syracuse player in that tournament, to the third round where she was eliminated by Suzana Rodrigues of LSU in three sets, 3-6, 6-4, 6-3.
In addition to individual accomplishments, the Orange has also had success as a team. SU won three BIG EAST team titles in the early ‘80s, and finished in the top two every year for 11 years between 1982 and ‘92.
Most recently, freshman Emily Harman was voted to the All-BIG EAST Team after finishing with a 14-8 record as SU's primary No. 1 player. Harman teamed with sophomore Christina Tan for a team-best 17-6 record at the No. 1 doubles post. Harman was one of 14 women named to the list, marking Syracuse's first individual BIG EAST award since Olga Votavova and Maria Vasiyeva were honored in 2007. In 2005, Victoria Vaynberg and Catherine Zawadzki were named to the all-tournament team as singles players at the BIG EAST Championship.
