USTA announces new Board of Directors for 2027-2028

Other elected officers for the 2027-2028 Board include:

William (Bill) McGugin will serve as First Vice President which will be his third consecutive term. McGugin currently serves as USTA Secretary-Treasurer, Chair of USTA Ventures and serves on the Investment Committee (Chair 2023-2024). McGugin is President and CEO of Iroquois Capital Group, Inc. (‘ICG’), a private equity firm based in Nashville, Tenn. He is also Chairman/President/CEO of REIT Investment Group, LLC, a portfolio company of ICG, which McGugin founded in 2006.

Chris Capossela will serve as a Vice President which will be his second term. Capossela is a visionary global executive with more than three decades of leadership at Microsoft, including 11 years as Executive Vice President and Chief Marketing Officer. He is a proven board leader across public and private organizations with deep expertise in governance, audit and compensation oversight, and strategic growth.

Kathleen Francis will serve as a Vice President which will be her fourth consecutive term. Francis has more than 30 years of experience leading the development and implementation of high-impact marketing and youth development programs. Her professional career spans corporate, professional sports league, venue, and not-for-profit sectors. Francis has created and executed unique, multi-faceted sports marketing and inclusion strategies for organizations including Major League Baseball, the Meadowlands Sports Complex, and the USTA. Currently, she is President of Oasis Sports Ventures and President of Women in Sports and Events.

Perren Wong will serve as Secretary-Treasurer which will be his second term. Wong is an active grass-roots volunteer currently serving as Chair of the USTA Investment Committee and a member of the USTA Compensation Committee. He previously served on and as Chair of several other USTA Committees, task forces and with USTA Ventures. Wong serves as a board member of the Junior Tennis Foundation and as a founding board member of the Asian American Pacific Islander Tennis Association. Wong is a Managing Director at Morgan Stanley where he is currently the Head of Private Banking Operations.

Directors-at-Large for the new Board term include:

Catherine (CiCi) Bellis will serve her second term and as an Elite Athlete on the USTA Board. Bellis played professional tennis on the WTA Tour, reaching No. 35 in the world at age 17. She won one WTA Challenger, seven ITF titles and was the 2017 WTA Newcomer of the Year. As a USTA junior, Bellis won six USTA National Junior Singles Championships and was ranked No. 1 in the G18s in April 2014. That same year, she won the USTA Girls 18s hardcourts and was ITF Junior World Champion. In July 2023, she founded Cartan Capital—a venture capital firm centered around sports and health. She also works as a broadcaster for Tennis Channel and CBS Sports.

David Champoux will serve in his first term as a Director-at-Large on the USTA Board. Champoux previously served as President and Section Delegate of the New England section, and chaired both the Sectional Presidents’ and Sectional Delegates’ committees. He has served as one of the four Sectional representatives to the USTA Budget Committee since 2023 and previously served on other USTA and section-level committees and task forces. He is one of the owners of Apex Racket & Fitness in Portland, Maine. He previously practiced corporate and transactional law for nearly 40 years.

Violet Clark will serve as a Director-at-Large on the USTA Board which is her fifth consecutive term. Among her other tennis-related Board roles, Clark served as the first African-American President of the Chicago District Tennis Association Board. She is currently the founder of Non-Profit Strategies and Solutions and is a strategic business consultant and corporate advisor specializing in optimizing leadership, governance, and long-term strategy for high-impact, complex, large-scale nonprofit organizations. In addition, Clark is General Counsel of UCAN Chicago and is of Counsel at Laner Muchin, Ltd., focused on employment law and labor relations matters.

Amanda Moore will serve her second term as a Director-at-Large on the USTA Board. Moore is a long-standing member of the coaching community, has served on the USTA Southwest Board of Directors and on the management committee for USTA Texas, as well as on other national committees. Before coaching, Moore competed at the University of Southern California (USC) achieving All-American status and competed on the pro tour for three years, achieving a Top 300 WTA ranking in both singles and doubles.

Jane Biondi Munna will serve her first term as a Director-at-Large on the USTA Board. Munna is a Managing Director at JPMorgan Chase & Co. (JPMC), where she is the General Manager of the Chase Marriott Bonvoy credit card portfolio. She has served at JPMC for nearly 15 years in executive roles across finance, marketing, and communications, including as chief of staff to the CEO of Chase. Her career has spanned more than 25 years across financial services and sports, including leading marketing and special events for the Los Angeles Dodgers.

Jon Rydberg will serve his second term and as an Elite Athlete on the Board. He has served as Chair of the USTA Athletes Advisory Council since 2025. He is the Tennis Representative for the Team USA AC (Athletes Commission). Rydberg is the U.S. men’s captain for World Team Cup (2018-present), a youth and high school coach (2009-present), and a Courage Kenny Rehab Institute volunteer coach. He serves as the USTA Athlete Representative to the USOPC.

Sam Warburg will serve as a Director-at-Large on the USTA Board, previously serving on the Board during the 2019-2020 term. Warburg was an NCAA All-American, NCAA doubles champion and PAC-10 singles and doubles champion at Stanford University. After graduating, Warburg played on the ATP Tour for five years, reaching a career-high of No. 132 in singles and No. 117 in doubles. At the conclusion of his playing career, Warburg moved into the tech industry where he has spent the past 16 years building, developing and leading high-performance, go-to-market sales teams in San Francisco.

MaliVai Washington will serve his first term and as an Elite Athlete on the USTA Board. In 1989, Washington reached an ITA singles No. 1 ranking while at the University of Michigan. On the ATP Tour he reached a singles ranking of No. 11. In 1996 he was a Wimbledon finalist and represented the U.S. in the Olympics. He competed on three U.S. Davis Cup teams in his career. In 2024, he was inducted into the USTA Florida Hall of Fame. He is the Founder of the MaliVai Washington Youth Foundation and has a passion for public speaking and financial literacy. 

Hon. Derek J. White will serve his second term as a Director-at-Large on the USTA Board. White was the first African American to serve as the CEO and President of the USTA Southern section, the largest section which serves 23 percent of USTA members. He opened and managed The White Law Group from 2000-2021 and was elected to the State Court of Chatham County, where he currently serves the citizens of Chatham County, Ga.

Brian Vahaly will serve as Immediate Past President on the USTA Board, where he was the youngest Chair in the organization’s history and the first openly LGBTQ+ Chair of any of tennis’s four Grand Slam tournaments. He served six non-consecutive terms on the USTA Board and previously chaired its Audit and Budget Committees, helping to launch USTA Ventures. During his term as Chair, Vahaly also served as Co-CEO of the USTA. Vahaly played professionally for seven years, reaching a career-high ATP singles ranking of No. 57. He currently serves as a Senior Advisor at Brown Advisory.

Full-length biographies on each of the Board of Director Elects will be available on USTA.com at the start of the 2027 term.