March 1, 2010
Columbia, MO - University of Missouri Head Tennis Coach Blake Starkey has been named the 2009 USTA Missouri Valley Coach of the Year. He received the award Feb. 20 at the USPTA Missouri Valley Annual Convention. The convention was held at the Homestead Country Club in Prairie Village, Kansas, just outside of Kansas City.
"The committee felt this was overdue," said Gary Prost, who ran this year's convention. "Coach Starkey has worked very closely with the USTA and the USPTA, and clearly has strong ties to tennis to the Missouri Valley, Midwest tennis, and Columbia tennis. He has coached the Missouri Valley Fed Cup team for us on nine different occasions. Simply looking at his roster tells you his heart is close to the Missouri Valley Section. He was instrumental in getting some strong events held there in Columbia, and he has just done a tremendous amount of work within the Valley. Besides coaching, we also know he has been very active in Columbia's tennis. We had some great nominations, but his efforts really stood out."
Besides Mizzou coaching accomplishments, other areas that pointed out on Saturday were Coach Starkey's creation of Mizzou's annual Ace-For-A-Cure tournament, which raises funds and awareness for breast cancer, a cause central to his team; free kid's clinics he runs at the Green Tennis Center introducing kids to tennis; a ball kid program that allows area kids to occasionally serve as ball kids for the doubles portion of Tiger home matches; his direction of two weeks of Missouri Tennis Camps, with Valley scholarships awarded; "Date Nights" each year where his players run tennis activities for kids while parents go out on a "date"; various clinic work including a competitive edge clinic run at the Green Tennis Center; and Coach Starkey's overall involvement in getting all of his players active in community service projects of their own.
Through the USPTA, Coach Starkey is a USPTA P-1 instructor. He holds a Master's Degree in Sport Science. He recently participated in a USTA High Performance program in Berkley, California this past year, and has been selected for the upcoming High Performance program in Florida. As Mizzou's coach, Starkey is actively involved in numerous tennis efforts in Columbia, and throughout the state.