Local tennis in 'good spot'
As a coach, an instructor and the general manager of Merchant Centre Court, Noel Clayton has been involved with Owensboro-area tennis for a long time — and he still passionately works to help drive interest to the sport.
With 18 courts available between the Owensboro Tennis Complex (12 outdoors) and Centre Court (six indoors) and others at Moreland Park, Clayton says, there’s plenty of opportunity for locals to learn to play and get better.
“I think tennis is in a really good spot,” he said Friday. “It’s definitely growing. With adults, the best opportunity is something called adult red ball that we do on Thursday nights. It uses a slower ball, a longer racquet, and the best part is it’s played on the pickleball courts (outside). You can get some confidence going pretty fast.”
And, with top-of-the-line facilities, Owensboro is the perfect host for statewide and regional competitions.
“We’re not seeing a growth in tennis courts in Louisville and Lexington,” he said. “We’re seeing less courts there, which opens opportunities for us. The biggest tournaments — the USTA 18-and-over and 40-and-over tournaments — we could partner with Henderson and offer a really good product and host one of those with 800 people here.”
A highlight on the docket for later this summer will be the 2025 Junior Team Tennis State Championship on Aug. 9-11, with almost 70 competitors scheduled to play.
Owensboro has become the host of the Great Midwest Athletic Conference tournament at Centre Court, in coordination with Kentucky Wesleyan College.
And, as the longtime coach at Owensboro Catholic High School, Clayton is always interested in creating youth tennis opportunities.
“We put in a bid with the All ‘A’ Classic people to start and to host the All ‘A’ state tennis tournament starting next year,” he said. “It would be May 1-2, and our proposal says we’d play it all there at the Owensboro Tennis Complex. It would be a lot of matches — boys’ and girls’ team championships, 16 boys’ teams, 16 girls’ teams — so it would be great for a lot of reasons.
“We’ve had discussions with the KHSAA to at least get the team state championships here. If we can pull that off on the All ‘A’ level and do a good job, I think we can have one of the best tournaments in the state.”
After all, Clayton knows firsthand what that experience would be like after the Aces reached the KHSAA Boys’ Tennis Team State Tournament semifinals for the first time earlier this month in Lexington.
“That was pretty magical,” he said of his team’s run, which ended in a 3-2 loss to state runner-up Paul Laurence Dunbar. “That’s the first time we’ve been able to break the round of eight. It’s so exciting because tennis is already such a tough sport, but then you’ve got a kid out there playing not only for himself but for the team. Even though we came up short, it was really cool.”
Clayton, 65, has been the OCHS boys’ tennis head coach for the past 19 years and was an assistant coach to his wife, Brenda, for five years before that. For his efforts, he was voted the Kentucky High School Tennis Coaches Association’s Boys’ Coach of the Year.
“I never thought I’d do it for 24 years,” he said, laughing, “but it’s been fun.”
