Dick Gould on ParentingAces

Summary

Dick Gould, the John Elheim Director of Tennis at Stanford University and former head coach for 38 years (17 NCAA team championships, 10 NCAA singles championships, 7 NCAA doubles championships), discusses two remarkable achievements: completing Stanford’s $20 million endowment of its tennis program — possibly the only fully endowed tennis program in American college athletics — and the development of Stanford’s live-streaming system for all 17 competition courts. He frames both as survival strategies for a sport under institutional threat and models for what other programs must do to secure their futures.

Guest Background

Dick Gould served as Stanford University’s men’s tennis head coach from 1966 through 2004 — a 38-year tenure during which he produced 17 NCAA team championships, 10 NCAA individual singles champions, 7 NCAA doubles champions, 9 players who reached the top 15 in ATP singles rankings, and 14 players in the ATP doubles top 10 (7 of whom achieved a world number-one doubles ranking). He currently serves as the John Elheim Director of Tennis at Stanford, a position created to handle community relations, facility development, and fundraising that the head coaching role no longer has time for. He received his master’s and undergraduate degrees from Stanford.

Key Findings

1. Stanford’s Tennis Program Is Fully Endowed at $20 Million — Possibly the Only One in the US

Gould describes the culmination of a multi-decade fundraising effort: Stanford’s tennis program has achieved a complete $20 million endowment covering all scholarships, coach salaries (including the head coaching position endowed at $3 million), assistant positions, facilities, and operating expenses. He suggests Stanford may be the only program in all of American college athletics that is truly and completely endowed — financially protected regardless of future athletic department budget decisions.

2. Endowment as a “Fight or Flight” Survival Strategy

Gould frames the endowment effort not as an optional fundraising achievement but as a “fight or flight” imperative. With 400 schools having dropped tennis programs over the preceding 30 years and new power conference formations threatening to force further cuts in non-revenue sports, tennis programs that are not endowed face existential risk at every budget cycle. Endowment converts that existential risk into structural security — a program that cannot be eliminated for financial reasons.

3. Scholarship Endowment Mathematics: Over $1 Million Per Scholarship

At Stanford, where tuition is approximately $62,000 per year, a single scholarship endowment requires over $1 million in invested capital (at a sustainable payout rate that covers the scholarship while allowing the principal to grow with inflation). Fully endowing 4.5 men’s scholarships required over $4.5 million — before addressing coaching positions, operating budget, or facilities. The financial scale of full endowment explains why it is rare.

4. Stanford’s Live-Streaming Infrastructure Covers 17 Courts

Gould describes Stanford’s live-streaming system as the output of a deliberate, fundraising-supported infrastructure investment: 17 competition courts are equipped with camera and streaming systems, recently upgraded to HD on the six primary competition courts. The system is available at streamingtennis.com and delivers live scoring (superimposed from the umpire’s court scoring input) alongside match footage. He frames it as the only realistic alternative to traditional TV coverage for a sport where $40,000 per match TV production costs are not viable.

5. Live Streaming Reduces Barriers for Family, Fan, and Recruiting Engagement

The Stanford streaming system serves multiple functions simultaneously: families of players who cannot attend in person watch matches; tennis fans follow Stanford’s competitive results; and college coaches recruiting high school players can watch potential recruits compete without traveling. Gould sees the streaming system as broadening Stanford tennis’s community and institutional relevance in ways that expand alumni support and donor engagement.

6. The Director of Tennis Role: Community Relations and Facility Stewardship

Gould’s transition from head coach to Director of Tennis reflects a pragmatic division of labor: as coaching demands (recruiting, practice planning, match strategy) became more intensive, the community relations, facility maintenance, and fundraising functions required someone who could give them full-time focus. At 50-60 hours per week in this role, Gould demonstrates that the operational infrastructure of a successful tennis program is as demanding as the competitive coaching itself.

Actionable Advice for Families

• Research the endowment status of any college program you are seriously considering — programs with no endowment are financially vulnerable and could be eliminated before your child completes their college career
• Track Stanford’s live-streaming at streamingtennis.com as a reference point for what college tennis digital media infrastructure can look like at its best
• Support college tennis endowment campaigns through donations when possible — the math is clear, and programs that are not endowed face structural elimination risk that endowed programs do not
• Understand that the director of tennis role at top programs is as important as the coaching role — the administrative infrastructure that supports a program shapes its long-term health as much as the coaching quality in any given year

INTENNSE Relevance

• Financial sustainability model: Stanford’s endowment-as-survival-strategy is a lesson for INTENNSE’s own financial architecture. The league needs a financial model that survives economic cycles and athletic market fluctuations — whether through endowment, recurring sponsorship revenue, or other structural mechanisms
• Live streaming as fan infrastructure: Stanford’s 17-court streaming system — built in 2014 for amateur college tennis — is an early version of what INTENNSE needs at the professional level. The architecture (cameras on every court, cloud delivery, superimposed scoring) is the same; the production quality INTENNSE needs is higher
• Coaching and administration as separate functions: Gould’s separation of head coaching from program direction is a governance model INTENNSE can apply. The people who manage the competitive experience (coaches) and those who manage the institutional infrastructure (league operations) need to be different people with different skill sets
• Dick Gould as strategic relationship: As possibly the most accomplished college tennis program builder in American history, Gould is a strategic advisor relationship for INTENNSE. His knowledge of what builds a sustainable tennis institution — financially, competitively, and in terms of community relationships — is directly applicable to league building

Notable Quotes

“Tennis is a threatened species in many schools. About four hundred schools have dropped tennis in the last thirty years. If you’re not endowed, you’re vulnerable. It’s that simple.”

“We felt that if we could endow the program fully, it can never be taken away because of financial reasons. That was the whole point — to make tennis permanent at Stanford.”