A New Era

Newman was left with a clean slate and two programs to work with after the switch from DI to DIII. The first thing he did was realize that the chapter that he played through and previously coached was over. Newman is not a man who dwells too much on the past. When the University converted the tennis program to Division-3 he let go of the previous era and looked to the future. In order to build the program from the ground up in the new division, Newman relied heavily on recruiting good players and investing in their lives. “Recruiting is ginormously important, but so is coaching. You can have a great player but if they don’t feel like you care about them, it doesn’t matter” Newman told me in a personal interview. His most successful coaching tactic came in the shape of authentic care and genuine investment in each of his players. Newman carried on the SAT acronym that Mabry had taught him and sought to develop his student-athletes as people and tennis players. The off-court life lessons were equally as the on-court tennis lessons. The program began getting traction quickly and Newman and the Tigers rose to the top of the national rankings in 7 years. The years of 1998 and 1999 saw deep runs in the NCAA tournament, and then in 2000 history was made.