Overmatched : Fiscal Crisis Beats a Proud CSULB Tennis Team

Impeccable under a golden sun, the green and flowerpot-red courts at Cal State Long Beach seemed like paradise to Peter Smith, coach of the 49er men’s tennis team.

“On a day like today, I can’t even imagine not being here,” Smith said at a recent practice. “It’s been such a part of my life.”

But Smith, 26, who played tennis for the school and has been the coach since 1987, is close to being jobless.

He and his players have been faced with uncertainty since last month, when Athletic Director Corey Johnson announced that men’s tennis, as well as men’s golf and men’s and women’s swimming, would be eliminated because of a budget crisis.

“It’s a shame,” Smith said. “College athletics is just one big business. I told Corey that I thought I busted my butt for this program for four years and it didn’t get me anything.”

Johnson made his decision after President Curtis L. McCray told him to help trim $14 million from the university’s $155-million budget by July 1. The crisis stems from the governor’s proposed budget for 1991-92, which reflects significant losses in state revenue.

Smith is not optimistic that the sport can be saved. He said he was told by Dan Radakovich, executive associate athletic director, that $70,000 would have to be raised by June 1 and another $70,000 by Jan. 1 to keep tennis afloat.

But Radakovich said Tuesday that $130,000 is needed by June 1 to satisfy Johnson’s requirement for a two-year reprieve. He denied telling Smith that only $70,000 was needed.

“That’s par for the course around here,” Smith said when informed of Radakovich’s comments. “I guess it’s all irrelevant. I wouldn’t have been able to raise the $70,000. But $130,000--that’s ludicrous.”

Rather than falling apart since learning of their sport’s likely demise, the 49ers have won seven of 10 matches, to improve to 13-10. They also defeated 17th-ranked Harvard in a recent tournament at UC Irvine.

“We’ve tried to use it as a motivational force, to show people they made the wrong decision,” Smith said. “We have to stick together.”

Smith, who grew up in San Diego, played for the 49ers from 1982-86 and then went on the pro tennis tour for 15 months. He was ranked about 400th in the world in singles and 300th in doubles. “I knew I could survive, but not make a good living,” he said.

He returned to CSULB to finish work on his bachelor’s degree, and succeeded Larry Easley as men’s tennis coach in 1987.

“I thought this was such a good opportunity,” said Smith, whose salary is $32,000 a year. “We had been No. 2 in the nation (in 1986-87).”

The 49ers, who won the NCAA title in 1967--the first for any team at the school--have traditionally been strong. They have produced no well-known pros, but several All-Americans.

Smith has a winning record (48-46) despite having one scholarship and playing schools that usually have five.

He has been a persistent recruiter, selling prospective players on the campus, the toughness of the schedule and his coaching ability.

He has persuaded players, who have been good enough to win scholarships at other schools, to come to Long Beach as walk-ons with the promise that “I’m going to work as hard as I can to make your game better.”

So each afternoon Smith tries to coach while worrying about whether he will be able to get a job at another college or at a club as a teaching pro.

“He’s really sad,” volunteer assistant coach Will Moravec said of Smith. “He’s a true 49er guy dedicated to the program. He wanted to make it better. He looks like he’s laid-back, but he’s one of the most competitive guys I know.”

Of the 49ers’ 16 players, 11 are underclassmen who will be affected if the sport is dropped.

It is too late for most of them to win scholarships elsewhere because most schools have finished their recruiting. Some probably will leave anyway, but Vincent Mackey, the team’s top player, and No. 2 William Pham intend to stay.

“Going someplace else would be like starting over,” said Mackey, a graceful, left-handed sophomore from Los Angeles who has an explosive forehand, a 19-8 record and All-American potential.

But Mackey realizes that, without a team, it will be difficult to find the daily competition that will prepare him for a possible pro career. “It will be tough to find practice,” he said. “I’ll have to set up matches with coaches in L.A.”

Pham, a junior political science major who had a 3.8 grade-point average last semester, said he will probably stay so he can graduate next year. Because his ambition is to join the pro tour, he said that he will still try to play as much tennis next year.

There were wails of dismay and shouts of joy from the various courts during the 49ers’ losing match with Fresno State last Friday.

Only a handful of spectators watched.

“The competition is great,” said Al Bray, 68, who said he was the Long Beach city champion in the late 1940s. “You see the same shots here you do in the pros. The only difference is they can’t sustain it.”

Bray sat in the small grandstand watching the doubles with another regular, Les Wylie, 80.

“We come to enjoy the few that are left,” said Wylie, the grandfather of former Wilson High tennis star Willy Quest, now at Duke University. “There’s a lot of old guys who flit in and out of here. It’s a high level of tennis. I like the team aspect.”

The 49ers used to play on courts, since demolished, that students had to pass on their way to parking lots. Now the team uses courts away from the mainstream of the campus, next to the football practice field.

“No one comes by here, so it’s tough,” Smith said.

When the 49ers hit vicious overheads in practice, sending balls bouncing over the fence, it is as if they are directing their frustration toward the football team that practices nearby.

“They don’t deserve all those scholarships (66),” said Mackey, who shares the school’s one tennis scholarship with Pham, Scott Potthast and Jamie Turturici.

Potthast, a junior who will probably transfer to Sacramento State, added, “They’ve never had a good football team. All the problems would be solved if football would be cut.”

After practice Monday, Smith made his players run sprints across one of the courts. Then he made them run 1 1/2 miles.

“You gotta love it, guys,” the coach said as they bent over with exhaustion, perspiring as much as the football players, but with the additional burden of sweating the future.