Panzarella has role in Bona tennis success

Moritz: Panzarella has role in Bona tennis success

05/02/2003

ST. BONAVENTURE — He stood quietly in the back row, shook a few hands, shared a few kind words with a couple of players and watched the selection show as intently as anybody in the room.
He applauded with everyone when St. Bonaventure’s name finally appeared on the NCAA men’s tennis brackets.
But after a few minutes, Pat Panzarella quietly walked out of the Fast Break Club in the basement of the Reilly Center.
This day belonged to the current members of the Bona tennis team, though his presence was tangible.
Without Panzarella, the retired men’s and women’s tennis coach and a member of the school’s hall of fame, the Bonnies would never be where they are.

“This is the direction we were hoping to go,” Panzarella said after the selection show. “When I retired, I said to (then-athletic director) David Diles that within five years, we were going to win the Atlantic 10.”
He wasn’t right, but he was close.
Six years after he retired from coaching in 1995, the Bonnies won their first A-10 title and made the NCAA Tournament. This year, they won it again and are playing at Texas next week in the first round.
“It’s absolutely fabulous,” Panzarella said. “It’s been a long road.”
He’s traveled most of it.
An English professor at the school, Panzarella spent 29 years as the men’s tennis coach. Before retiring in 1995, his teams won over 50 percent of their matches.
More importantly, he helped the program grow from a small one playing a Division III schedule into an Atlantic 10 power.

“We started in the Eastern 8, which back then had an individual tournament,” Panzarella said. “The match for the last spot was always St. Bonaventure against somebody else.
“The problem was, the program was created to make tennis available for students who were here. We had no recruiting, no scholarships.”
Starting in the late 1980s and early 1990s, the program got some scholarship money. The Bonnies’ schedule improved, playing more Atlantic 10 matches and taking several trips down South and out West.

“That helped us recruit,” Panzarella said. “We started to get players from all over the world.”
Gradually, the Bonnies improved, finishing as high as fifth at A-10s.
“I remember going down to Penn State,” Panzarella said. “I walked in the locker room and saw on the board, ‘St. Bonaventure — a team to be feared.’ That didn’t happen before — we were playing Niagara, Canisius, Gannon, Mercyhurst.”
Since Panzarella retired eight years ago, Michael Bates has taken the program to a whole new level.
Bates is a three-time Atlantic 10 Coach of the Year. Vili Nurmi and Mario Arce have both been named A-10 Players of the Year.
And even though it’s not his program any more, Panzarella’s always been supportive of the team.
“It’s a great thing for St. Bonaventure,” he said. “It comes at a very good time for the school ... we could use the good press.
“This is the culmination of a lot of work, and Mike has done an absolutely fabulous job.”
(Brian Moritz is a sports writer for The Times Herald.)