Davenport heads list of Tennis Hall of Fame inductees

NEWPORT — Growing up playing tennis in California, Lindsay Davenport says she never thought that one day being inducted into the International Tennis Hall of Fame was even in the realm of possibility. Then in 1999, the then-23-year-old won the women’s singles title at Wimbledon.

“I’ll never forget after winning my second Grand Slam, Bud Collins said to me, ‘Well, darling, I’ve got to tell you, I think you’re going to get in the Hall of Fame now,’” Davenport recalls. “That was the first time I’d ever really thought of that.”

Fifteen years and several more Grand Slam tournament victories later, Collins’ words are ringing true.

Davenport is one of five individuals slated for induction into the International Tennis Hall of Fame this summer in Newport, Hall of Fame president Stan Smith announced Monday.

The Class of 2014 also will include five-time Paralympic medalist Chantal Vandierendonck, as well as renowned tennis coach Nick Bollettieri, Jane Brown Grimes and British tennis broadcaster and author John Barrett.

They all will be honored at the Hall of Fame Enshrinement Ceremony, to be held July 12, prior to the semifinals of the Hall of Fame Tennis Championships in Newport.

Davenport was in the hospital about to give birth to her daughter, Haven Michelle, when ITHF chairman Chris Clouser called to give her the news of her induction.

“So I didn’t have time to really digest it then,” she said with a laugh, during Monday’s conference call with the media. “But certainly over the last few weeks and months, it’s been a really fun time, and I look so forward to July and being able to celebrate with everybody else in Newport.”

One of only four women, along with Chris Evert, Steffi Graf and Martina Navratilova, who have been the year-end World No. 1 women’s tennis player at least four times, Davenport amassed 55 singles titles and 38 doubles titles over the course of her 17-year professional career. Among those victories were three Grand Slam singles titles, three Grand Slam doubles titles and a gold medal at the 1996 Olympics.

“Now retired and removed from my playing days, it is such an honor to think of myself being able to achieve the highest honor in tennis,” said Davenport, 37, who serves as an on-air commentator and analyst for Tennis Channel when she is not caring for her four young children with husband Jonathan Leach. “A little bit overwhelming.”

A national-caliber tennis player before a car accident in 1983 left her confined to a wheelchair, Vandierendonck went on to win the first wheelchair tennis ITF World Championship in 1991 and then again in 1996 and ‘97, as well as five Paralympic medals. She was ranked the No. 1 player in the world for a total of 136 weeks in singles and 107 weeks in doubles.

The 49-year-old Vandierendonck is both the first woman wheelchair tennis player and the first Dutch tennis player to be inducted.

Bollettieri, Barrett and Brown Grimes will be inducted under the contributor category, which recognizes individuals for their contributions to the growth and development of the sport.

The 82-year-old London-born Barrett first became involved in tennis as a player, then transitioned to equipment representative, tournament director and esteemed broadcaster, not to mention distinguished historian and author. He will be joining his wife Angela Mortimer Barrett, a former world No.1 player, who was inducted into the hall of fame in 1993.

For more than three decades, Bollettieri has coached numerous tennis champions, including hall of famers Andre Agassi, Jim Courier, Monica Seles and Boris Becker, as well as Venus and Serena Williams, Maria Sharapova and Tommy Haas just to name a few. He founded the Nick Bollettieri Tennis Academy in Florida, which in 1978 was the first full-time tennis boarding school and is now known as the acclaimed IMG Academy. The 82-year-old New York native has also been involved in a number of other youth tennis and scholarship programs.

Still actively involved in the tennis industry at the age of 73, Brown Grimes has helped shape the sport through the various leadership positions she has held with the International Tennis Hall of Fame & Museum, the Women’s Tennis Association and the United States Tennis Association, as well as through her extensive involvement with the International Tennis Federation.

“We were talking earlier about the fact that I’m actually only the fourth woman in the contributor category,” Brown Grimes said when asked to reflect on the fact that there will be three women inducted this year. “So I’m hoping that there will be many more coming behind me. There are many, many men who have been inducted in this category. But to have Chantal in this class, the first wheelchair champion, and of course Lindsay, who was one of the great, great American champions . . . . It’s nice that we’ve got two guys in there with us, Nick and John. Happy that they’re along, but this seems to be a women’s class, and bravo.”

Tickets both for the Hall of Fame Championships and the Rolex Hall of Fame Enshrinement Weekend are on sale now and can be purchased at HallofFameTennisChampionships.com or by calling (401) 849-6053.