Thriving UA men's tennis program faces brutal road trip | Greg Hansen

Clancy Shields has turned Arizona’s men’s tennis program into the school’s most successful sports program, a three-time Pac-12 champion now ranked No. 14, with two contenders for NCAA championships, Colton Smith and Jay Friend. On Friday, Arizona beat No. 7 UC San Diego 4-0 on Shields’ home turf. I assumed competition in the Big 12 would diminish from the Pac-12 standard of national powers USC, UCLA and Stanford, but it hasn’t turned out that way. Shields’ team probably has the most brutal road trip of the UA 2024-25 sports calendar from March 21-25 when it travels to face No. 2 TCU, No. 11 UCF and No. 18 Baylor in a five-day period. Don’t expect the Wildcats to get swept.

– I had to chuckle last week when ASU basketball coach Bobby Hurley, one of the last holdouts for shirt-and-tie game day attire, wore a hoodie for the Sun Devils’ loss to Houston. Worse, the words GUARD U were on the front of Hurley’s hoodie. That’s sad. Arizona State was “Guard U” for about 10 minutes in December 2017 when it upset No. 2 Kansas and No. 17 Xavier. None of those guards — Shannon Evans, Remy Martin, Kodi Justice, Tra Holder — ever played in the NBA. The “Guard U” days were short-lived. By Dec. 30 that season, Arizona beat the 12-0 Sun Devils, who then collapsed, finishing 8-10 in the Pac-12, unranked, and losing an NCAA Tournament “play in” game. Not quite a grand tradition to advertise eight years later.

– Last week, I wrote about Arizona becoming something of “Athletic Department U,” citing 10 ex-Wildcats who went on to become Division 1 athletic directors from 1980-2025, capped by Army’s hiring of Tom Theodorakis last week. Unfortunately, I omitted No. 11, Ted Kissell, whose career arc was fascinating. A former tennis player at Indiana, Kissell moved to Tucson to become a school teacher. He led Tucson High to the 1978 and 1980 state tennis championships, going 128-1. He was then hired as Arizona’s tennis coach and in his first season, 1981, was Pac-10 Coach of the Year. After six seasons, Kissell became part of the athletic department administration and in 1992 was hired as the AD at Dayton, a job at which he thrived in for 17 seasons. Now retired, Kissell and his wife Deanna have returned to Tucson and spend the winters here.

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– Keshad Johnson‘s time with the NBA Miami Heat has temporarily ended. Arizona’s 2023-24 standout forward was sent to the G League last week after spending six weeks in the NBA. He averaged 1.6 points in six games at Miami but did not play in nine consecutive games before returning to the Sioux Falls Skyforce.

– If you thought Sahuaro High School girls basketball coach Steve Botkin‘s 658 career coaching victories was impressive — and it surely is — how about this one: Botkin coached the Cougars to the state playoffs this season for their 38th consecutive season, 24 by him and 14 by his predecessor, Jim Scott. I spent an hour or two researching Tucson record books trying to find a team in any sport in Tucson to produce 38 consecutive playoff seasons. Couldn’t find any except for individual sports like wrestling and tennis. The Cougars play in the Class 4A quarterfinals Thursday at Cactus Shadows.