When former Penn women's tennis coach Cissie Leary died in November 1996, the collegiate tennis community lost one of its most passionate devotees.
Passing away at the age of 42 from scleroderma and cancer, Leary -- namesake of the Intercollegiate Tennis Association Cissie Leary Sportsmanship Award and inaugural member of the Penn Tennis Hall of Fame -- spent 20 years of her life coaching tennis at Penn.
"The game of tennis was really only the vessel in which she poured her passion for life and for teaching," Penn President Judith Rodin said of Leary at a memorial service in 1997.
For the past six years, the Penn women's tennis team has honored their late coach with the Cissie Leary Invitational, a tournament which started as a small way to remember Leary, but has turned into one of the biggest college women's tennis tournaments in the nation.
"So many people want to play in it because of who she was," current Penn women's tennis coach Mike Dowd said. Dowd was an assistant of Leary's from 1995 to 1996.
While athletes will compete as individuals, some of the nation's top teams -- last year's 18th-ranked Northwestern, No. 42 Ohio State and No. 56 Harvard -- will be coming to Penn this weekend.
The other teams competing are Princeton, Lehigh, Penn State, Temple, Tulane, Minnesota, Columbia and Old Dominion.
The top four seeds in the tournament are ranked in the nation's top 25.
Penn's Alice Pirsu, currently ranked 12th in the nation, is the invitational's top seed. In her first collegiate competition since her run to the Elite Eight of the NCAA tournament last spring, Pirsu -- who will play both singles and doubles this weekend -- looks to become the first Penn athlete to win the Cissie Leary.
"Stamina may be an issue for her," Dowd said of Pirsu.
But if Pirsu is going to win the tournament, she'll have to defeat three past champions -- defending champ Julie Smekodub of Tulane, 2001 champ Nataly Cahana of Old Dominion and 2000 winner Danira Penic of Temple.
Working in Pirsu's favor is the fact that a different player from a different school has won each year. Nor would it be surprising if an unknown freshman walked away with the title this weekend, as three of the tourney's six winners have been first-year athletes.
"Some may call it beginner's luck," Dowd said. "They're so new maybe they don't have any nerves yet."
Besides Pirsu, Dowd expects big things from another senior, Nicole Ptak, a 9-16 seed.
"She's playing very well this fall," he said. "Expect her to have a good showing here."
