Patton Is Leaving UCI to Coach at Boise State

Greg Patton, the UC Irvine men’s tennis coach who built a nationally prominent program and became known for his comically elaborate metaphors, is resigning to become the coach at Boise State.

Patton, 39, who guided Irvine to the national top 25 in all but three of his 13 seasons as coach, called the decision a difficult one, but attributed it to a desire for “quality of life” for his family. Patton and his wife, Christa, have a 15-month-old daughter, Chelsea, and are expecting another child in November.

Patton traveled to Boise, Ida., to interview for the job last Tuesday, and his wife joined him before they returned Saturday. Both of them were taken with the city.

“It’s like a Frank Capra movie,” Patton said. “It’s like ‘It’s a Wonderful Life.’ Everyone knows each other.”

Patton will take about a $6,000 cut from his base salary of about $37,000 at Irvine to take over at Boise State, a school with little tennis tradition.

“I’m going to have to work hard up there, but that’s OK,” he said. “It’s almost like a spiritual thing. I want to raise my kids up there in the clean air, where there are no traffic jams and there’s no fear of drive-by shootings. If I was single or didn’t have children, it would have taken not only Rambo and Conan but the Predator, too, to drag me out.”

Patton said he made his decision because of his family, not because of the ongoing budget crisis that led Irvine to drop baseball, men’s track and men’s cross-country in May.

“Obviously, I think it entered my decision,” he said. “I’m more alarmed, not at UCI, but at the lack of emphasis put on education and sports in Southern California and California all together.”

Athletic Director Tom Ford called the timing of Patton’s move “coincidental.”

“First of all, we’re going to hate like heck to lose him,” Ford said. “We do hate to see them move on to some place else. We understand the reasons that they’re doing it. If that’s what they want do, Godspeed. We want them to be happy.”

Boise State, which recently built six indoor courts, has never won a Big Sky Conference title in men’s tennis.

“We are thrilled to have a person of Greg’s caliber joining our staff,” said Gene Bleymaier, athletic director at Boise State. “He will take the tennis program to a new level at Boise State. Greg is one of the best coaches in the country.”

Under Patton, Irvine’s team won nine conference titles and reached the NCAA championships five times. Their best national finish was fourth in 1989, when the Anteaters had a record of 25-7.

Patton was named national coach of the year by the Intercollegiate Tennis Assn. in 1987, and was chosen as conference coach of the year five times.

Under his guidance, seven Irvine players were named conference player of the year, and during his tenure, Irvine won 39 conference singles titles and 21 conference doubles titles.

Patton had made his decision before the team’s awards banquet Sunday night--”I haven’t slept the past four nights,” he said--but chose to withhold the news until Monday, when he called a team meeting.

“We went out on the field and he said how much fun he had this year, how much he enjoyed coaching us and that this decision was as tough a decision as he has had to deal with,” said Neel Grover, a junior on the team who had decided earlier to skip his final year of eligibility to attend law school. “None of us still had any clue. Then he just threw it on us, that he had resigned. No one said anything for about five minutes. We all stood there in shock. When you think of UC Irvine tennis, it’s synonymous with Patton. He always treated us like family.

“I think it’s time he takes care of his own real children. He’s given us so much. He deserves it and so does his wife. It’s still a shock to me. . . . Boise State has got to be the luckiest program in the country.”

Patton will be allotted the NCAA maximum of five scholarships at Boise State, the same as at Irvine.

“My main goal is to win the Big Sky and try to be the top team in that region,” Patton said. “I am leaving a perennial top-20 program for one that has never been close. This is a real challenge. I feel like a carpenter. I have built one program and now I want to see if I can build another one.”

Leaving Irvine will be hard, Patton said, and he purposefully did not inform Ford he was considering the Boise State job until he had made his decision because he did not want to waver.

“This opportunity, this boat, only comes by one time,” Patton said. “I don’t feel like I’m jumping ship. I’m jumping on another. When you jump ship, you’re jumping on the shore.

“Like I said, I love Irvine.”

Patton’s Teams Net Success

Conference National Year College Record Finish Ranking 1992 UC Irvine 11-12 1st 25 1991 UC Irvine 18-9 2nd 16 1990 UC Irvine 19-13 1st 16 1989 UC Irvine 25-7 1st 4 1988 UC Irvine 22-8 1st 6 1987 UC Irvine 25-11 1st 15 1986 UC Irvine 18-12 2nd Unranked 1985 UC Irvine 27-11 1st 23 1984 UC Irvine 23-13 1st 20 1983 UC Irvine 31-8 1st 13 1982 UC Irvine 29-12 2nd 20 1981 UC Irvine 21-17 1st Unranked 1980 UC Irvine 19-17 5th Unranked 1979 CS Bakersfield 19-19 1st 9 (Division II) 1978 UC Santa Barbara 26-10 5th Unranked 1977 UC Santa Barbara 18-14 4th Unranked Total 351-193