“It saddened me greatly,”
says Parker, who served as asso- ciate athletic director for wom- en’s athletics from 1977-1991. “I taught tennis almost all my life. And it was gone.” Ideally, to Wasik and Parker,
tennis will become so popular again among students and fac- ulty that there will eventually be support to add on-campus courts for recreational use. But for now, the new courts should be a boon to the varsity team. “It’s vital for every Division
I program to have a facility to call their own,” Ray says. “It’s re- ally going to help with recruit- ing and the overall atmosphere of the program.”
The Mid-American Confer-
ence tournament will soon stop rotating equally among the league’s schools with tennis teams. After the current rotation completes, the regular-season champion of the previous year will host the post-season tour- nament. With its new courts, Eastern Michigan is better equipped to attract the student- athletes capable of bringing the event back to Ypsilanti. “The players know: If you
don’t have a facility, there are many that do,” Ray says. “Noth- ing’s like having the campus atmosphere.” Because the Eagles will still
play their home matches at the Chippewa Club when the
weather pushes them indoors, it’s unclear when the new tennis complex will host its first spring match. Most years, Wasik, who spends her winters in Florida, would not be in Michigan for the start of the spring tennis season. But this year, Eastern Michigan’s first outdoor match will be held at the courts named in her honor –certainly a reason to juggle travel plans. “I would certainly make an
attempt to be there,” Wasik says. Whether or not she’s in atten- dance for that match, nobody would argue that she was there for Eastern Michigan and its ten- nis team.3
—Dan Feldman
courts will raise the profile of tennis, a sport they still hold dear. Parker remembers when on-campus courts had coin boxes that students could feed to keep the lights on and play at night. “We would take the quarters
and replace the nets,” Parker says. Eventually, those courts
were demolished to create parking lots and new facilities. Though the transition was un- derstandable, and maybe even necessary, that didn’t make it easy for Wasik and Parker.
Claudia Wasik (left) and Lucy Parker continue to provide leadership for women’s athletics at EMU. Eastern | SPRING 2013 13
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