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Tennis vulnerable as colleges consider sports cuts

In this undated photo provided by Southern Utah Athletics, Ghita Nassik hits the ball during tennis practice at Southern Utah University in Cedar City, Utah. Southern Utah announced June 23, 2020, it was eliminating its menÕs and womenÕs tennis programs effective immediately due to budget cuts brought on by the coronavirus pandemic. (Joey DeGraaf/Southern Utah Athletics via AP)

By STEVE MEGARGEE

AP Sports Writer

The promise of college tennis lured Abhimanyu Vannemreddy from his home in India to the United States, where he settled in at Winthrop in South Carolina.

Now he’s pondering his future thousands of miles away from his family as financial reality crashes down on his sport.

Winthrop announced last month that both its men’s and women’s tennis programs will be dropped because of budget woes resulting from the coronavirus pandemic. Tennis has been hit hardest among college programs as athletic departments nationwide ponder cutting sports to save money.

“I was definitely caught by surprise,” Vannemreddy said. “No prior warning or rumor about the program shutting down. It was just a random call one day and just found out it’s done.”

Dozens of college tennis players across the country are in similar situations. Men’s and women’s tennis are the only sports dropped by more than four Division I schools since the start of the pandemic, according to AP research.

East Carolina, Northern Colorado, Southern Utah and Wright State have eliminated men’s and women’s tennis over the last three months. Green Bay suspended its men’s and women’s tennis programs indefinitely while in Arkansas, UAPB suspended them for the year. Appalachian State cut men’s tennis, while Akron dropped women’s tennis. Connecticut won’t have a men’s tennis team after 2020-21.

“My assessment is some of these cuts had probably been in the works,” said Timothy Russell, the CEO of the Intercollegiate Tennis Association, the governing body for college tennis. “Usually when there’s a cut, there’s a big hue and cry. There’s so much going on with the noise in this environment, it’s easier to make these cuts with nobody paying as much attention.”

Nearly 89% of Division I schools had women’s tennis programs and 71.5% had men’s teams as of 2019, but these recent cuts have raised concern and pushed officials to seek solutions.

Tim Cass, a former New Mexico and Texas A&M coach, now is general manager for the U.S. Tennis Association’s national campus in Florida. He believes colleges can help their programs by opening on-campus tennis facilities to their communities, hosting junior or adult tournaments and offering after-school programs.

“If you’re doing that, more than likely your program has a very good chance of being safe,” Cass said.

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