Director of Athletics Kent Weiser has announced that Emporia State Hall of Honor inductee Les Stafford will return to campus to take over the Hornet men's and women's tennis programs.

"I'm looking forward to coming home to Emporia State," said Stafford. "It's not often you get the opportunity to be the head coach at your alma mater and I am excited to see what we can do with the program moving forward."

Stafford has spent the last 15 years as the head tennis pro at Crestview Country Club in Wichita, Kan.  He is a United States Professional Tennis Association (USPTA) Certified Pro and has taken junior players to regional and national level competition.
 
Stafford spent 14 years as the head coach of the women's program at Wichita State from 1990-2004 and was a four-time conference coach of the year for the Shockers.  He went 178-143 in dual match play with four conference tournament championships and one regular season title.  His players earned 38 all-conference awards in his 14 seasons. The last 11 years of his tenure at Wichita State included being the Director of Tennis for the Sheldon Coleman Tennis Complex. In this role he organized leagues, clinics, and junior programs for an eight court public tennis facility that was also the home of the Shocker tennis program.

"I'm excited to have Les Stafford return to Emporia State to take over our tennis programs," said Weiser. "He is well known in tennis circles across the state and is respected by the Hornet tennis alumni. I look forward to working with him and seeing how we are able to re-invigorate our men's and women's tennis programs."

Stafford was a four-time NAIA National Tournament qualifier during his career with the Hornets. He went 20-5 in singles while going 20-6 with Ken Hush in doubles in 1979 as Stafford and Hush were the first teammates in District 10 history to qualify for singles at nationals in the same year.  As a senior in 1981, he won the  #1 singles and #1 doubles championship at the CSIC Tournament. Stafford ended his career by winning three doubles matches and one singles match in his final appearance at the national tournament.  He maintained his playing career after college and was the #1 ranked singles player in the state of Kansas for seven years and was ranked #1 in the state in doubles for 15 years.