Audra Anderson has been named director of tennis at Southern Illinois University-Carbondale.
The announcement was made Aug. 5 on siusalukis.com.
Anderson, who has coached the school's women's team for nine seasons and was Missouri Valley Conference Coach of the Year in 2013, will oversee the men's team as well with her new position. The structure will have her as sole head coach for the program, with two graduate-assistant coaches on staff as well, Anderson said in an email interview with SE Illinois News.
“Now we can do more things together, which is exciting. We can support each other's program more,” she said. “But my biggest duty is going to be the management part — making sure everything is running smoothly. I will need to train our GA's to be strong leaders.
Anderson has complied a 140-83 record at Southern Illinois and has the best winning percentage (.627) in the program's history, including a 44-22 mark in the MVC. Eight individual players and four doubles teams have earned all-conference honors under her direction. The Salukis went 16-12 last season.
The opportunity to be in charge of both the men's and women's teams arose when men's coach Dann Nelson accepted the head men's job at Texas Rio Grande Valley after 11 seasons in Carbondale. In that span, Nelson had 122 wins, led the program to the NCAA Tournament in 2009 and twice won MVC Coach of the Year honors. The men's team was 14-5 last season and shared the MVC title with Wichita State
Anderson said she has been teaching tennis for 20 years, starting with instructing in the city-park program in her hometown of Clarinda, Iowa, for five summers beginning with the season before she went to college at Concordia University in Nebraska. She played at No. 1 singles and No. 1 doubles all four years at Concordia, earning All-Great Plains Athletic Conference honors each season, including being named the league's Tennis Player of the Year in 2000. Anderson was an Academic All-American in tennis and volleyball in 2000 and 2001.
After serving as graduate assistant coach at Concordia while working on her master's, Anderson became head tennis coach at Lindsey Wilson College in Columbia, Kentucky, where she coached women and men. She was named the Mid-South Conference Coach of the Year from 2005-07 and was a finalist for NAIA National Women's Coach of the Year in 2007.
Anderson said she started playing tennis at the age of 9, when her brother, who is two years older, started playing the sport. She said she went to his lessons to watch, and when there was an odd number of players, the instructor asked Anderson if she wanted to play.
“The first year, I got beat by everyone because I was so young and little,” she said. “But I kept playing and hit with my brother every day.”
Every year after that, Anderson said, she won first place in the city tournament.
Anderson said she's improved as a coach by learning from her mistakes as well as getting ideas from other coaches.
“You have to stay open-minded to new ideas, new techniques — but keep it simple overall,” she said. “You don't want to make the game too complicated or have your athletes over-thinking things on the court.”
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