Andrew Beaton and Joshua Robinson:
Howard Endelman was busy running his own private-equity firm when he got offered the job he couldn’t refuse: assistant tennis coach at an Ivy League school.
The gig wasn’t glamorous. It involved traipsing back and forth between Columbia’s campus in Morningside Heights and the university’s courts at the northern tip of Manhattan. It also required him to spend his time selling high school tennis stars on a college better known for sending graduates to the Supreme Court than to Wimbledon’s Centre Court.
But Endelman couldn’t say no to his alma mater. And more than a decade later, that decision has never looked better. Endelman, now the head coach of the men’s team, has led Columbia to the NCAA tournament’s Elite Eight for the first time in school history and a showdown with No. 1 seed Ohio State.
In a tumultuous semester on the university’s campus, roiled by tensions over Israel and Palestine, his tennis team has delivered an unexpected moment of levity.
“Could we beat Michigan or Alabama in football? Impossible,” Endelman says. “In tennis, it’s possible.”