Texas Celebrates Wheelchair Tennis at 50

2025-2026 USTA Texas Wheelchair Committee chair, Harold Graham, has led the committee for two terms but has been working to support access to tennis for years. He said the group is specifically focused on visibility and access. 

“We view wheelchair tennis as important for having tennis be a sport for everyone and anyone,” he said. “We've tried to increase the number of players playing tennis in chairs. We've wanted to increase the number of opportunities and we have wanted to increase the coaching numbers in wheelchair tennis.”

He said they’re bringing wheelchair tennis to more Texans by thinking outside the box about how to share playing opportunities with those who might not have been aware of opportunities to play tennis in a wheelchair. 

“We have outreach to communities, to wheelchair basketball programs, to schools in civic organizations as well as churches and such to increase the number of opportunities,” he said. “Specifically, what we've been targeting is wheelchair basketball players, which has about eight times more players nationally than chair tennis had two years ago.”

They are also working to make inroads in existing tennis organizations and events to show that with a few minor modifications (allowing two bounces on one side of the net) that standing and chaired players can compete almost immediately. 

“We're very happy that the people and the committees such as junior competition and the and the coaches through the section have included at the Texas Slam, which is the [USTA Texas section] championship, to include a wheelchair division and that the Texas Tennis Coaches Association  [TTCA] through Bobby Kleinecke, has created a Texas Tennis Wheelchair High School Championships.”

Cindy Benzon, USTA Texas Community Services Coordinator and Adapted Tennis program coordinator and Texas Tennis Hall of Famer, said the next horizon in the junior space will be more clearly integrating wheelchair tennis into UIL tennis, the primary group overseeing school athletics in Texas. 

“We've really worked hard on UIL the past few years because we always have coaches that come back to us and [say players in chairs] they can't play on our team, but it's in the Friend at Court that they can, but maybe they can't find it in there,” she said. “I think UIL is definitely on board now and understands that more players are coming. We're not there yet, but I think we're going to get there. I think it'll happen.”

And opportunities don’t end there. The infrastructure around high-level wheelchair tennis has also grown significantly in the collegiate space. For example, many colleges now have competitive collegiate wheelchair tennis teams, like the University of Houston, which under the leadership of Dr. Michael Cottingham and coach Gabriel Gutierrez have grown their program significantly - hosting high-profile clinics, tournaments like the Cougar Open, and a National Championship-winning wheelchair tennis team in 2024.

Turic, who coaches junior players who now compete regularly at the section, national and international level, said these new opportunities are remarkable. 

“It's awesome to see my players getting recruited the way I did before my injury—to be getting recruited, catered to, and offered a collegiate scholarship and sports opportunity that I wasn't sure would really continue to exist," he said.

STEADY GROWTH

Reflecting on over 20 years of work helping cultivate Texas’s wheelchair tennis offerings, Benzon said the opportunities for competition have increased significantly. She said when she started working in this space there were far fewer opportunities. 

“About the only tournament was the Texas Open,” she said. “That was the only Texas tournament that we had. So, we focused more on the run rolls back then.”

Run Rolls are events where players in wheelchairs and those standing would compete together. 

Turic, whose DWTC still runs the Texas Open, noted that the tournament was central to the growth of competitive wheelchair tennis in the US. 

“the Texas Open Wheelchair Championships—its most current name; it's had a few other names over the years, like Southwest Regionals, Southwest Sectionals—it's been in existence since 1981 when the godfather of wheelchair tennis, Randy Snow, brought wheelchair tennis to Texas. His very first goal was to have a tournament,” he said. “Randy went to where wheelchair athletes were, which were on basketball courts, and he got all these great local Dallas basketballers to start trying [wheelchair tennis.] They got together and started playing tennis and hosting the Open Wheelchair Championships in 1981."

The tournament has evolved over the years including professional and non-professional competitions. Turic said recently the focus has been on making the event as inclusive as possible to the most players.

"We really desperately needed to grow and get back to the grassroots,” he said. “We focus on those opportunities because they can make the dollar go a whole lot further when there's no big prize money to give away."

Benzon said there are now many more opportunities for all ages and all levels of competition - from beginners to advanced, high-level competition. And events like the Texas Open and the University of Houston’s Cougar Open can regularly attract national and international competitors. 

Benzon said the growth of junior tennis offerings is already showing results. 

“I think the changes that we've had since I started is that we have a lot more kids now than we did back then,” she said. “We have quite a few more juniors participating.”

GROWING COMMUNITY

Benzon noted that wheelchair tennis tournaments feel much more supportive and tight-knit than some other events, reflecting the commitment by players and organizers to work together to help share the sport. 

“At a wheelchair tournament, players stay all day and watch and they watch everybody,” she said.  “I don't know if you get that in the able-bodied space … People will go play their match and then they'll leave. In the wheelchair space, they stay and support each other all day long.”

It’s the work of that community of players, coaches and organizers that have worked tirelessly to effect these changes and they’re ready to grow wheelchair tennis more. 

“We've been beating the drums,” Benzon said. “I think when people come to events, or when I go up to a person or up to a volunteer or to a CTA, they know what's coming. [They know] it’s either going to be adapted tennis or it's going to be wheelchair tennis and that I'm going to ask them to do something.” 

But the barriers for player access continue to loom large. In addition to finding play opportunities, Benzon noted there are financial costs to playing wheelchair tennis - the costs of sports chairs can be significant. 

“The other challenge for the players themselves is the cost of a sports chair is just crazy," she said. “There's there's grants out there, but it could take a year from once you apply for that grant until you find out if you get the funding to buy your chair.” 

USTA Texas has invested in chairs to assist with introductory events and camps for players who may not have ever played in a sports chair, as well as additional player and organizational support.  

When players have access to equipment, and standing tennis players and organizers see opportunities for integrating wheelchair tennis into their existing events, visibility and access will follow. 

“Something that the committee works on and going forward: Asking 'how can we get more of our wheelchair players in the able-bodied space?'” She said, “Then that just creates more awareness across the board.”