United States Tennis Association celebrates one year anniversary
The United States Tennis Association (USTA) today commemorated their one year anniversary of the USTA National Campus, which officially opened on 2nd January 2017, in Lake Nona, Orlando as the new “Home of American Tennis.” In its inaugural year, nearly 200,000 players visited the amazing facility, with more than 100 international, national and local tournaments held throughoutthe year. The USTA National Campus, featuring 100 courts over 64 acres, is open to the public and serves the entire spectrum of the tennis community, including youth players,recreational players, collegiate athletes and future and current professional tour level players.
Today’s one year celebration included tennis icons Jim Courier and Gigi Fernandez, joined by City of Orlando Mayor Buddy Dyer, Orange County Mayor Teresa Jacobs (pictured above left), USTA Chairman of the Board and President Katrina Adams (pictured above right), USTA Chief Executive Officer and Executive Director Gordon Smith, state and regional partners, as well as ESPN’s Chris McKendry, serving as emcee.
USTA President, Chief Executive Officer and Chairman of the Board Katrina Adams said the impact of the USTA National Campus has been bigger than she ever imagined, and she promised even more to come in the coming years.
“To say this has been an amazing year for the USTA National Campus would be an understatement,” Adams said. “When we set out to create this place, we wanted to design a facility that would be all things to all levels of players. That’s a pretty large challenge, but working as a team, we rose to that challenge in an equally large way. While it was a great beginning, we know it’s only a beginning. We know that there are so many more success stories yet to be written here, for every level of player, and we are determined to write them. So as we celebrate this anniversary, we do so with an eye toward future anniversaries, greater success and the continued growth of the sport we all love.”
In total, more than 150,000 hours of court time were booked to players of all ages and abilities last year, and that number is only expected to grow in 2018.
The USTA Pro Circuit is returning to Lake Nona this year with tournaments in January and March, and USTA League, the world’s largest recreational tennis league, will once again crown dozens of champions over five different weekends at the USTA National Campus later this fall.
Also returning in 2018 is College MatchDay, one of the USTA’s primary platforms to showcase college tennis, featuring a slate of eight matches on six dates that will highlight some of the nation’s top college tennis programs. Last year, more than 300 colleges and universities played at the campus.
USTA Executive Director and Chief Operating Officer Gordon Smith (pictured above) said the facility allows the USTA to pursue its mission to grow the game and help the next generation of American players. As part of his pledge Thursday to build on the campus’ growth in 2018, Smith announced that the Tennis Channel will be building its own broadcast center at the National Campus to broadcast events on-site.
“This campus has allowed us to do so many things,” Smith said. “It’s allowed us to bring all of our resources together and so many talented people here to make a tennis laboratory like nothing in the world. I don’t believe I can be contradicted when I say more tennis talent is accumulated here than in any other place at any other time in the history of the planet. When you put this incredible range of world-class talent across multiple disciplines in one place, they interact as never before. The results aren’t just additive, they’re exponential.”
Looking ahead in 2018, USTA University, a broad professional development initiative that will help prepare the next generation of tennis providers, will launch and a new coaching accreditation program aimed at setting mandatory standards for the development of those new to the profession will be offered across America.
Further ahead, the USTA National Campus will host the NCAA Division I men’s and women’s collegiate championships in 2019 and 2021, as well as the men’s and women’s Division III championships in 2022.
