The University of Texas at Austin Athletics
Longhorn Hall of Honor: Kathleen Bogue Cummings
11.17.2010 | Texas Athletics
Nov. 17, 2010
Kathleen Cummings approached her tennis game seriously, always competing with a determined grimace on her face. Even practices were treated like an NCAA Tournament match.
She was the ultimate competitor, perpetually focused and poised. One local sportswriter watched her play and described her as the "heart, the leader and the inspiration of the 1984 Texas team."
"She was focused, poised and she thought her way through points," said Jeff Moore, UT Women's Tennis coach until he retired in 2005. "She was intense."
Cummings grew up in Richmond, Virginia, and received a scholarship to the University of Colorado. In 1981, she was the world's top-ranked tennis amateur at No. 48 and competed in the summer as an amateur on the Avon Futures Tour. She won 11 straight matches and upset the legendary Virginia Wade in three sets.
"She had this stubbornness that was great for a tennis coach," Moore recalled. "She did not give anything away."
Cummings was a three-time All-American at Colorado and reached the semifinals of the 1982 AIAW National Championship. Then in the spring of 1982, Texas women's athletics director Donna Lopiano hired Moore to coach Texas women's tennis, and Cummings transferred to finish her career with Moore, who is also a UT Hall of Honoree inductee.
Despite playing just one season at UT, Cummings is regarded as one of the top players in school history. Cummings pushed the Longhorns to the 1984 Southwest Conference team title and into the NCAA Round of 16.
"There was this coolness and maturity that surrounded her during a match," Moore said.
With a crisp two-handed backhand that was a winner either cross-court or down the line, Cummings outlasted and outsmarted her opponents.
Moore prized her competitive instinct. As she matured intellectually, so did Cummings' on-court skill. She was able to think tactically about her matches and opponents, and use her backhand to her advantage.
"She was a point-pincher," Moore said. "As she got older and wiser, she took more chances. Not many competed better than she did."
Cummings won the SWC singles title, had a dual match record of 29-7 as a senior and ranked fifth nationally. She earned 1984 SWC Player of the Year honors and was later selected to the SWC All-Decade team for the 1980s.
Cummings graduated in 1984 with a journalism degree and in 1992 received a nursing degree from the University of Virginia. A registered nurse for the last 18 years, she currently works at a progressive care neonatal unit in Midlothian, Virginia. She resides with her husband, Steve Schmidt, and son, Bogue.