The Santa Barbara Athletic Round Table will be inducting seven new members into its Hall of Fame on Monday, Sept. 18. The Induction Class of 2023 includes four athletes, a coach, a community leader and a special achievement honoree.
This is the sixth in a series of stories about this year’s inductees.
A million-to-one shot from a BB gun blinded Greg Patton in the right eye when he was just 12 years old, squelching his dreams of becoming a dead-eye basketball star.
“I wanted to be Dr. G,” he once told a reporter, in reference to hoops superstar Julius “Dr. J” Erving.
Patton’s mother, Rita, did some research and learned that he could still navigate well enough spatially on a tennis court. They both took up the sport with a passion, each one eventually becoming a coach.
“An accursed event was actually a blessing, and a real turning point in my life,” he said.
Greg, the eldest son of Santa Barbara News-Press sports editor Philip Patton, played for Bishop Diego High School during the Cardinals’ early reign as a CIF-Southern Section tennis dynasty.
He graduated in 1971 after serving as the school’s student body president. He continued on to play tennis at UCSB and serve as the Gauchos’ team captain. He also played the doubles circuit on the pro satellite tour.
He later joined the Peace Corps, organizing recreational programs in Ghana, Africa, before contracting a near-fatal case of dysentery.
He eventually rejoined UCSB’s tennis program as an assistant coach. At age 24, he took over from Gary Ogden as the Gauchos’ head coach during the spring season of 1977.
Patton became the first coach to win NCAA Division 1 coach of the year honors at two different schools (UC Irvine in 1987 and Boise State in 1997).
His son, Garrett, who served last spring as the boys tennis coach at Santa Barbara High School, was an All-Mountain West Conference player for him at Boise. Greg’s daughter, Chelsea, is now an assistant women’s tennis coach at Hawai’i Pacific University.
Patton retired at Boise in 2018 as the fourth-winningest coach in NCAA Division 1 history, with 808 victories. His teams won 24 conference championships and advanced to the NCAA Tournament 27 times during his 37 seasons as a coach.
He was coaxed out of retirement, however, to coach the Boise High School tennis team with his wife, Christa, the last two years.
He also still serves as a USA National collegiate coach. That team has won 10 titles in the 12 years that he’s taken it to France for the World University Championships, posting a match record of 34-2.
Patton previously served two stints as the U.S. Junior National coach — from 1984 to 1987 and 1998 to 2002 — while guiding such stars as Pete Sampras, Jim Courier, and Michael Chang.
He coached Team USA at the 1989 Pan American Games in Havana, Cuba and coached World Team Tennis for 13 years, earning its coach of the year award in both 1993 and 1995. He also spearheaded the effort that brought the 2013 Davis Cup to Boise for a quarterfinal match between the U.S. and Serbia, which was led by a young Novak Djokovic.
He’s been inducted into seven other halls of fame: at UC Irvine (2000), Boise State (2001), the Idaho Tennis Association (2013), the Intermountain Tennis Association (2015), the Intercollegiate Tennis Association (2019), the Blue-Gray Intercollegiate Tennis Classic (2020), and his alma of Bishop Diego High School (2022).
The Class of 2023 includes Alex Mack (San Marcos High), Sami Hill (Dos Pueblos), Paula Charest Lilly (Bishop Diego) and Jenna Ridgway Corliss (San Marcos) being honored for their achievements as athletes; Greg Patton, a Bishop Diego and UCSB alum, recognized for his remarkable coaching career; San Marcos alum Harvey Bottlesen, who founded the Santa Barbara Tennis Club, is the community leader, and journalist John Zant, a UCSB alum, is being inducted for his seven decades of providing quality sports writing for the community.
In addition, the SBART is honoring one its founders, 96-year-old Bill Bertka. He is a L.A. Lakers legend, having been a part of 10 championship teams as an assistant coach and consultant.
The SBART Hall of Fame Induction Ceremony will be held at the Cabrillo Arts Pavilion. Tickets can be purchased at this link.
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