Texas’ women’s tennis coach and former professional tennis player Howard Joffe will close out his ninth season with the Longhorns this year as he faces a new challenge. With 17 years of collegiate coaching under his belt, Joffe led a team of eight freshmen into their first year in the Southeastern Conference.
“At the risk of sounding like an old curmudgeon, whining about social media and what have you, I think circumstances and the times have changed, but the philosophy remains the same,” Joffe said. ”You’re always trying to serve the kids in a way that brings out their best, their best tennis selves and of course the best people inside them.”
The Johannesburg local held a No. 2 national ranking in South Africa as a junior player. He has a singles gold medal and silver doubles medal from the Maccabiah Games, which invites Jewish and Israeli athletes to participate in summer and winter sports in Israel. Joffe played collegiate tennis at Pepperdine for two years, earning All-American Honors his final year, and went on to play professional tennis from 1992 to 1995 when he qualified for the Association of Tennis Professionals Tour.
With a storied history, Joffe began his collegiate coaching career in 2008 at Miami University in Ohio, where he led the team to second and first place finishes in the Mid-American Conference. He then spent two years at Maryland before moving to Texas to coach at Texas A&M for four years, leading the Aggies to a tied-first place finish in the SEC. In 2016, Joffe made the switch from maroon to burnt orange.
“I got a lot of flack for switching over and, of course, people are taking shots at me and those things are part of the rivalry,” Joffe said. “I think it’s wonderful that Texas and Texas A&M are competing against each other, certainly two of the biggest schools in the huge state of Texas.”
Joffe’s time has proven better spent with the Longhorns as he guided the team to back-to-back National Collegiate Athletic Association team championships in 2021 and 2022.
After the 2022 season, star player No. 44 Peyton Stearns elected to go pro following No. 49 Lulu Sun who turned pro earlier the same year. The hope with the freshman-dominated team is to rebuild, said Joffe.
“The object of the exercise is to coach them up and get them the experience, the requisite experience,” Joffe said. “Perhaps in the coming year or two, add another excellent player or two and get back to the top again, get some more national titles.”
Joffe coached the Longhorns to four Big 12 titles and two NCAA team titles. Many athletes under his coaching have been named Big 12 Player of the Year, Intercollegiate Tennis Association’s Player of the Year and All-Big 12 honors. Most recently, freshmen pair Eszter Meri and Carmen Herea were honored as the back-to-back SEC freshman of the week as the team kicked off Intercollegiate Tennis Association play with five consecutive wins.
“I think that’s a tale as old as time, right?” Joffe said. “It doesn’t matter what money is offered and what money is paid and what NIL deals and which way it goes, the secret to winning is finding the right players and coaching them and inspiring them to be their best. And while I’m working at Texas, I’m going to continue to do that in whatever the environment.”
