I'm riding pretty high tonight because one of my former friends from college is now the coach of an NCAA National Champion. In fact, it comes 20 years almost to the day when she won one herself.
Earlier today, in Tusla, Oklahoma, UCLA and Cal faced off for the NCAA Women's Tennis title. This was the fifth time that the Lady Bruins made it to the finals, but the previous four times, they came up short. This time, however, Riza Zalameda led the Bruins to a 4-0 shutout of the golden Bears to finally claim a national championship in women's Tennis.
The head Coach of the Women's team is Stella Sampras Webster, whom I was friends with from our freshman year until around the time she got married. I considered her part of my "inner circle" of friends, which consisted of her, her roommate Diane whom I met the summer before, and the only friend left of the three, their Dorm floormate, Nikki.
Twenty Years ago, Stella was a dynamite fleshman player. She and her doubles partner, Allyson Cooper, captured the doubles title at the LA Tennis Center at UCLA in 1988. Somewhere, buried in a footlocker, is a shirt I bought at the championship as well as a tennis ball from the match that she autographed for me. I think Diane still has hers, I saw Nikki's sitting on a shelf in her home in Northern California the last time I was there.
So let me say to Stella, "Great going, gorgeous. I'm so proud of you, we all are."
