North Carolina Men & Women Hold No. 1 Rankings

The women have defeated the following top 10 teams (rankings listed as of March 30): No. 2 Texas; No. 3 Georgia, No. 5 Ohio State, No. 7 Pepperdine and No. 8 Virginia.

In the Oracle/ITA Division I Men’s Rankings, UNC’s Chapel Hill team was No. 1 from Feb. 17 through March 30. After North Carolina lost to Virginia last Sunday, Florida jumped to No. 1 and the Tar Heels fell to No. 2. Both UNC programs were winners of the ITA Indoor Championships in February.

Stanford’s powerhouse teams in both genders have had numerous national champions. In five years – 1986, 1988-90, 1997 – the Cardinal won both the men’s and women’s team championships.

Famed former Stanford head coach Dick Gould noted that both Stanford teams were champions in 1978, when the women’s competition was called the Association of Intercollegiate Athletics for Women. The NCAA men’s championships began in 1946 and the women’s started in 1982.

Other than those five years, research did not show any conclusive list of when a school’s men’s and women’s DI teams were ranked No.  1. While the secret of how rare this achievement might lie in a slew of ranking archives, some tennis experts said they couldn’t specify when a college held the DI top spot for both genders.

Granger Huntress, a voter in the Tennis Channel/USTA College Tennis Top 25 Ranking, said, “To have both UNC teams ranked so highly is a tremendous accomplishment. Not only is this a rare feat, but it speaks to the hard work and dedication of these student-athletes and their coaches, not to mention the support staff. These past 12 months have not been easy and to come out playing such high-quality tennis by both programs harkens back to the days when Stanford dominated college tennis.”

Two members of the UNC Athletic Communications Department did some digging but were unable to lock down if the university or other schools had two teams atop the rankings at the same time. In February 2016, the UNC men were No. 1 while the women were reported to be No. 2.