No Small Potatoes for Patton

Greg Patton warmed up with an opening forehand volley.

“I’m back from the dead,” he said, chuckling.

He was just finding his form.

“We’re starting a revolution,” he continued. “Everyone in Idaho is carrying tennis rackets instead of potato cutters.”

So, who is this guy, anyway?

An introduction to Boise State University--which is making its debut today in the NCAA men’s tennis tournament--is not complete without a few quips from Patton, its coach.

After all, the collegiate tennis world thought Patton was veering way off course when he abruptly left a nationally prominent UC Irvine program in 1992 and headed north. Before Patton arrived, Boise State had won precisely one conference championship.

“I was tired of the rat race and tired of the rats passing me by,” said Patton, who started at Irvine in 1979.

“I was 41 years old, and I wanted to raise my kids up there. You have to take risks and I had gotten too comfortable at Irvine. There was a risk moving [to Boise], but it turned out great.”

Instead of running the rat race in Southern California, Patton now can look out his back door and watch possums approach his doorstep.

Not everything changed, though.

At Irvine, Patton led the Anteaters to nine Big West Conference titles, and his coaching abilities and gift of gab didn’t desert him in Boise. The Broncos are 110-38 in his five seasons, which includes four Big Sky Conference championships and a Big West title earlier this month.

Today, the seventh-ranked Broncos (26-3) will play 16th-ranked Auburn (16-9) at 8 a.m. at the Sunset Canyon Courts on UCLA’s campus.

The Bruins (23-3), hosting the tournament for the first time since 1965, will play Northwestern (20-6) in another first-round match, at 2 p.m., at Los Angeles Tennis Center at UCLA.

Patton had an idea this team was special when Boise State beat UCLA, 4-3, on Jan. 17 in Los Angeles. All three of the Broncos’ losses occurred in March--to Middle Tennessee State, Virginia Tech and Harvard. Since the loss to Harvard, the Broncos have won 10 consecutive matches.

Naturally, Patton had a lively description of the route to the NCAA tournament, calling it a space adventure.

“It’s like ‘Star Trek,’ where no team has ever gone before,” he said.

His No. 1 singles player is Ernesto Diaz of Santiago, Chile, and others on the squad are from Sweden, Denmark and Armenia.

“They thought they were coming to California,” Patton said. “It took them a few matches to realize there were no beaches in Boise.”

Patton’s return is not the only interesting tournament story.

Three days ago, it was announced that Fresno State Coach Peter Smith would be taking the job at Pepperdine after the NCAA tournament, succeeding acting Coach Chuck Willenborg.

On Sunday, Fresno State beat USC, 4-2, in regional competition, ending the Trojans’ streak of 20 consecutive NCAA appearances. Since the NCAA switched to a team format in 1977, USC had qualified every year. UCLA’s streak of consecutive appearances is at 21.

Fresno State (17-11) will play Georgia (20-3) at 5 p.m. at Los Angeles Tennis Center, and defending champion Stanford (22-2) will meet Harvard (17-5) at the Center at 11 a.m.