Penn State head women[apos]s tennis coach Buffy Baker heads into her ninth season as head coach having already guided Penn State to its best ever Big Ten regular season showing and its first-ever NCAA Tournament appearance.
Baker is working hard to make Penn State a power in Eastern tennis. Consider her short tenure in Happy Valley:
In her first season as head coach, Penn State went 8-10, amassing more wins in one season than the team had combined for in the prior two. The Nittany Lions also broke a consecutive losing streak in the Big Ten when PSU beat Michigan State 7-0 on March 23.
The following season, Baker took Penn State to unprecedented heights. The Nittany Lions went 5-5 in Big Ten regular season play, its best-ever finish in conference play. The team also went 2-1 in the Big Ten Tournament, advancing to the semifinals for the first time in school history. A 15-9 regular season record earned Penn State and Baker their first-ever appearance in the NCAA Tournament. Penn State finished the campaign with a 15-10 mark and had two first team All-Big Ten selections for the first time in school history.
In 2002-03, the Penn State team went 8-14 overall and 2-8 in Big Ten play. The Lions downed Michigan State and Indiana in conference play and beat No. 8 seed Iowa in the first round of the Big Ten Tournament.
Baker is a veteran of Big Ten tennis, having served as an assistant coach at both Northwestern and Wisconsin. While at UW, she helped guide the Badgers to their first Big Ten title in 1996 and a Top 10 national finish. Baker assisted as the Badgers made three straight appearances in the NCAA Tournament during her three seasons in Madison. Baker began her coaching career as an assistant at Vanderbilt in 1992, moving on to Northwestern the next year where they were Top 10 in the nation. She was also an instructor at the North Carolina Outward Bound School.
Baker is active in the national tennis community as she is a member of the Intercollegiate Tennis Association (ITA) Board of Directors and on the women[apos]s tennis operating committee.
A 1992 graduate of Florida State University, Baker has nearly a decade[apos]s worth of coaching experience under her belt, including a one-year stint as the head coach at Boise State in 1998-99. She helped guide a young Bronco team and had two of her players make the All-Big West squad.
But Baker wanted to get back into the Big Ten. [quote]Penn State has all of the resources and commitment to take this program to the next level,[quote] she explains. [quote]The academics and the entire athletic tradition here are contagious. One can actually feel the enthusiasm which makes it a conducive place for success.[quote]
Penn State provides exactly what it takes to fulfill her expectations of that opportunity.
An outstanding player in her own right, Baker has a long and prestigious list of accolades. She was inducted into the Florida State University Athletic Hall of Fame in 1997. She won FSU[apos]s women[apos]s tennis Most Valuable Player Award four straight years. A Seminole fixture at No. 1 singles and doubles, Baker achieved a national singles ranking of No. 37 and a doubles ranking of No. 17. An excellent example of the collegiate athlete, Baker also won the Southeast Region Sportsmanship Award as a senior.
Baker and her husband Eric live in State College with their two daughters, Madeline (6) and Amelia (3), and infant son Will.
PHILOSOPHY: Baker[apos]s primary coaching desire for her future in Happy Valley goes far beyond the year-to-year goal of competing for a national championship.
[quote]I want to help develop the entire individual,[quote] Baker explains of her athletes. [quote]What these women do off the court is just as important as what they do on the court. They go hand in hand. How the athletes act and think and what they believe define the individual in every arena. I want them to leave Penn State ready to tackle the unknowns.[quote]
Baker is only the second Nittany Lion head coach since Penn State joined the Big Ten in 1991. She is already having a great effect on Penn State tennis as the Nittany Lions have advanced to the Big Ten Tournament semifinals for the first time ever, won the most conference duals ever in 2000-01, and had two All-Big Ten selections in the same season for the first time ever.
Baker brings her own coaching and competition experiences from a national scale to Happy Valley. [quote]Having worked for other programs, I have a good grasp of the work and athletic ability that are needed to attain success at an elite level. I feel like we have that here. We are going to have to strive for excellence. It will take hard work and a desire to push limits, both my own and the players[apos],[quote] says Baker, [quote]but the ability is there.[quote]
With her optimism and coaching successes and with the ability and drive of the Penn State squad, Baker has the potential to lead this program to the highest ranks in both the Big Ten and the NCAA.
Her philosophy is reminiscent of the saying, [quote]Some people see things as they are and ask `Why?[apos] I see things as they never were and ask, `Why not?[apos][quote]