Under Rump, Grossmont Women’s Tennis Comes Into Its Own

When 2 p.m. arrives on weekday afternoons during the school year, a couple of tennis classes meet on the courts tucked away behind Grossmont Community College.

One class is all men, the other all women. Each player receives two college credits . . . and a legitimate chance at winning a state championship.

Since Coach Bob Rump arrived at the school in 1962, the Grossmont tennis program has become one of the best community college programs in California. Under Rump’s guidance, the men have won 13 Pacific Coast Conference championships, four Southern California Regional championships and one state team championship and have finished second in the state three times.

The women don’t come close to matching those credentials, but give them time. Last year, after 24 years with the Grossmont men and 29 years overall coaching men, Rump, now 57, unexpectedly changed courses and accepted the women’s coaching job.

When he did, he knew he would have to alter his coaching philosophy, collect some extra enthusiasm and rustle up more patience than he ever thought he had.

What has happened is a tribute to the years of hard work and dedication Rump spent refining his coaching skills. In 1987, the Grossmont women won the Pacific Coast Conference with a 12-0 mark. It was their first conference championship of any kind since 1977, when they won the old San Diego Women’s Intercollegiate Athletic Conference.

This year, for the first time ever, the Grossmont women (14-1-1 overall, 7-0 in the PCC), like the men (14-3, 8-0), are ranked No. 1 in the state.

“I think we have an excellent chance (to win the state championship),” Rump said. “All I want is a chance to get that far.”

To do that, the Griffins must win the conference championship and the Southern California team playoffs (April 26-May 10) before advancing to the state finals in Ventura (May 13-14).

A trip to the state championships would be fitting because that’s where Rump thought he had finished his career a mere two years ago. After he coached the Grossmont men to their first state title in 1986, he retired, only to agree to coach the UC San Diego men’s team a couple of months later.

“I thought I had had enough coaching,” Rump said. “I really did. But I regretted retiring after I had done it.”

But soon after starting fall workouts at UCSD, he realized he had made a mistake. Although he wasn’t coaching at Grossmont, he was still teaching physical education classes. As soon as his teaching schedule finished each day, he would drive from El Cajon to La Jolla for practice. It got to be too much.

“Physically, I just couldn’t handle it,” Rump said. “I was fatigued. If I hadn’t still been teaching, I would have done it.”

For the second time in six months, Rump retired. But he was still interested in coaching. That’s when the women’s job opened at Grossmont.

“After 29 years of coaching men, I wasn’t sure if I could adjust my total philosophy of coaching to the women’s style of play,” he said. “I’d been used to totally different kinds of work habits.”

His no-nonsense approach comes not only from years of tennis, both coaching and playing, but also from 11 years of coaching football (including six at Grossmont College, three as an assistant and three as a head coach) and a four-year stint in the Korean War.

“Last year, it took me a long time to get the girls to the point where they would accept the type of work habits I expected them to have,” he said. “In the past, there was a tendency on the women’s team to come out to practice and kind of take it easy--maybe come in late, play for 15 minutes, go get a drink, fix their hair . . . those things used to drive me crazy.”

And the women knew it.

“I think he gets frustrated because we’re women,” said Megan Lowrey, the team’s No. 2 singles player and last year’s singles state champion. “Some of us aren’t as devoted as the men are. But in another way, I think he’s more relaxed because we don’t compete with ourselves.

“He’s such a fighter. He sees us wimp out and he just shakes his head. His face turns red.”

Running is a key word in Rump’s coaching vocabulary, and it’s one reason why the women’s work habits concerned him. Part of his success can be attributed to his strenuous conditioning program, of which weight lifting and running are integral parts. The team lifts weights in the fall and runs three to four days a week all year.

“I thought when I took over the women, God had created an 11th commandment: ‘Thou shalt not run,’ ” Rump said. “They hate it, but they found out it gives them an extra edge when that third set comes around. They kind of fought it at first, especially the new ones. They never had done anything like that before in tennis, so it had to be taught to them. I had to show them why it was going to help them. Problems with arms, knees and legs that come late in the season are because a player’s not in shape.”

Said Lowrey: “The girls who really want to win do it. I think it’s great.”

Few players want to win as badly as Rump does. One of his most memorable moments occurred years ago: “One time a player came up to me and said, ‘If we all wanted to win as badly as you do, we’d never lose.’ ”

His work ethic and conditioning program have paid off in a career coaching record of 467-110. Five hundred wins is a goal, as is becoming the first coach to win the California state championship in both the men’s and women’s divisions.

“I’ve never known anybody who can win the close matches like he can,” said Bill Speckmann, the assistant women’s coach, who played for Rump in 1965 and 1966. “When he sees what he thinks will be a close match, he gives it all of his attention. He cares about what an individual eats the night before a match and right before a match. He’ll take the time to call each member of the team and make sure they’re thinking about preparing themselves for the match, telling them to get some sleep and not overindulge in physical activity before the match. He gives it that much time.”

The intensity shows, especially on match days.

“He gets really nervous and smokes his cigars,” Lowrey said. “And when he drives the van (to away matches), he doesn’t talk. He’s real serious until after we win.”

Rump has toned down his practices to an extent. He makes the women run and lift weights, but not as much as he did the men. Instead of practicing for 3 or 3 1/2 hours, like he did when he coached the men, he will work the team for 2 1/2 hours.

“I’ve learned I can’t push the girls as hard or as long,” Rump said. “I can’t push them 3 hours and expect 100%. Their concentration goes.

“But I think I can teach them a lot more. They have a lot more to learn than the good men players. Most women are weak volleyers, but that’s because they just don’t play that kind of game. They play a baseline game. They only go to the net when they have to.”

As a result, Rump has probably done more coaching in the past two seasons than in many years.

“I think it’s good for a coach to work with the women,” Speckmann said. “It’s brought out coaching habits I haven’t seen in a number of years, such as skills he’s been able to teach the women. In the last 5 to 10 years, the guys have been so good that he hasn’t had anything to offer in terms of technique. The things he helped the men with in the ‘60s and early ‘70s he’s able to help the women with now--things like stroke production and racket skills.”

The second-year men’s coach, Don Ackerly, who played under Rump in 1977 and 1978 and coached under him at Grossmont from 1982-1985, said, “Sometimes he has to temper some of his intensity a little bit. And he’s had to change his style. The women don’t hit the ball as hard, but they keep it in play longer. So he’s changed some of his drills to work on keeping the ball in play rather than working on shots that are outright winners.”

But on the court isn’t the only area in which Rump has had to learn a few things.

“Food,” Lowrey laughed. “He’s really surprised at how much we eat. He’s really funny. Last year he was shocked at how much food we could eat and still run.”

He also has a different kind of rapport with his team than he did with his men.

“He’s like a dad,” Lowrey said. “We call him ‘Pops’ or ‘Father.’ He hears gossip, things about boyfriends, and all kinds of women problems. He loves to hear about it, and yet he doesn’t.”

Still, the transition has been easy in other areas.

“The men are more difficult to deal with sometimes during matches in terms of temper,” Rump said. “With the women, you generally don’t have outbursts of language and throwing rackets. The girls know I’m not going to have it.”

Freshman Wanda Yocom is currently playing No. 1 singles for the Griffins, and she is followed by, in order, Lowrey, Caren Hasselo, Rosemary Forbes, Diana Jezek, Tracy LaCorte, Christina Larrazabal, Melissa de la Rosa and Kristen Dean.

“I think the girls that are here are lucky,” Lowrey said. “I think they came here because of him and because they knew we’d have a strong team.”

Said Rump: “I don’t care what the sport is, the kids find the good programs and they come.”

Which helps explain the fact that, despite Rump’s leaving, the men’s team hasn’t missed a step under Ackerly. While the men are ranked No. 1 in the state, the difference between them and the women is that, thanks to Rump, the men are familiar with the position.

“Yeah, there was a lot of pressure,” Ackerly said, referring to his initial days on the new job. “Coach Rump built the program up with such success. And since I was a part of it when I played, I knew there was pressure to keep it going.”

The fact that Ackerly took over a team loaded with freshmen didn’t help. Still, he guided the Griffins to a 12-8 overall record and a conference championship (11-1) last year.

And 1988 is shaping up even better. No. 1 singles player Joe Thomas is undefeated and ranked second in the state. Kirk Edwards, David Mercado, Mo Jackson, Scott Del Mastro, Andy Reynolds, Manuel Ortiz and Steve Bennett are listed second through eighth, respectively, on the Grossmont depth chart. And Jackson, the fifth seed, played No. 1 singles last year.

The team is strong enough this year that most of the pressure Ackerly felt when he took over has subsided. It hasn’t been easy, though. It was difficult enough for Ackerly to take over the men’s program under Rump’s legacy, but Rump’s shadow became real rather than figurative when he decided to return to coach the women.

“I was a little concerned because it came as such a surprise,” Ackerly said. “But he and I are good friends, we’ve known each other for a long time and it doesn’t present any problems. It’s kind of nice. It’s easy to deal with what he does since I played and worked for him.”

Ackerly and Rump have to cooperate because the men and women practice at the same time. There are 10 courts--five that are in pretty good shape and five that both coaches would prefer to avoid. But since very few community colleges have exceptional men’s and women’s teams--usually it’s one or the other--they are able to coordinate their schedules.

“We both know which matches are important to each other this year,” Ackerly said. “So it’s easier to share court space without any difficulty. We make sure the person with the big match coming up, especially a home match, has the opportunity to work out on the good side.”

Rump and Ackerly would prefer it if they cooperated all the way through the state finals in May. A state crown would get Ackerly’s career off to an impressive start, and it would enable Rump to accomplish what has become an important goal.

“I still love coaching,” Rump said. “I get awfully tired sometimes, but I still enjoy putting a team together and watching the players improve as persons and as a team.

“The game is different, and it’s a different style of play. They are women, and I love every one of them. They’re my team.”