June 11, 2007
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Vanderbilt women’s tennis coach Geoff Macdonald has been named the recipient of the John R. Ingram Chair in Coaching Excellence Endowment for his outstanding, long-term performance.
It is believed Macdonald is the only women’s tennis coach in the nation operating from an endowed chair, a distinction normally reserved for deans and elite faculty.
“When one takes all aspects of the head coaching responsibilities into account – teaching, mentoring, recruiting, program management, public relations – we believe Geoff Macdonald is the finest in the nation,” says Vanderbilt Vice Chancellor David Williams, who oversees athletics. “I receive calls on a regular basis from other top programs wanting Coach Macdonald to lead their teams but he loves this campus and city. In turn, we want to reward him for making our program so special.”
Macdonald has a 279-89 record during years in Nashville. Many of those losses came while he was building the program into a perennial national power.
“As successful as Coach Macdonald has been on the courts,” Williams says, “he may be even more successful as a mentor. His teams are always among our school leaders in grade point average and the record track record of his graduates, either in tennis or in business, is most impressive. We think he is the consummate major college head coach, at the top of his profession in every important way.”
Athletically the team’s high-water mark to date came in 2001 when it played for the NCAA championship. He is one of the most decorated coaches in the nation, having been honored as Southeastern Conference Coach of the Year both at Vanderbilt and at LSU and also was the Atlantic Conference Coach of the Year while building Duke into a national power.
Vanderbilt Board of Trust Athletic Committee chairman John Ingram was instrumental in making the endowed chair a reality and has followed Macdonald’s performance closely.
“If I were fortunate enough to have a daughter talented enough to play at this elite level,” Ingram says, “I would want her to play for Geoff Macdonald. He offers tennis expertise and so much more.”
“What is particularly impressive to many of us is the tennis knowledge and teaching skill that Geoff possesses,” Williams explains. “He has a remarkable record of developing the Top 40 ranked high school recruit into a collegiate All-American and the elite recruit into a well-balanced professional. Very, very few coaches can do that. Some can recruit but struggle with coaching. Others can coach but can’t effectively run the program. Geoff Macdonald is the rare guy who does it all.”
Ingram calls Macdonald “one of the truly great teachers on Vanderbilt’s campus” and wants the endowed chair to publicly recognize over a decade of excellence.
At one recent point, Vanderbilt had more women’s tennis graduates playing professionally than did any other collegiate program. They included Julie Ditty, Aleke Tsoubanos, Sarah Riske and Kelly Schmandt. Of this foursome, only Ditty would have been considered an elite recruit coming in.
Former `Dore Annie Menees, a four-year regular who graduated in 2005, earned Vanderbilt’s coveted Founder’s Medal by graduating No. 1 in her class. Current team member Taka Bertrand was the 2006 SEC Player of the Year.
There are actually scores of outstanding products of Macdonald’s program. Outside of tennis, Macdonald protégées include business leaders, law and medical professionals, educators and successes in many other fields of choice.
More than one Commodore alumnus has said “you get more than a tennis education playing for Coach Macdonald.”
For these reasons, Macdonald is the first John R. Ingram Chair in Coaching Excellence Endowment recipient. He becomes the second Vanderbilt coach to be honored with an endowment; football coach Bobby Johnson has the Bronson Ingram Coaching Chair.