The Daily Herald had a huge (almost too big and embarrassing) front page article on Brad being inducted into the NCAA Tennis Hall of Fame. This was the picture that was on the front page.
They used 6 pictures in the article, I copied a couple of them and added here. This is Brad at the NCAA tournament in 1986.
This is a picture from the UCLA newspaper while Brad was in school.Brad Pearce, once a local high school tennis star, made his way from Provo to UCLA after taking cues from his father. It was 1984 when Pearce matriculated in Westwood, bent on the idea that if pops can't beat 'em, might as well join 'em.
• HE TURNED DOWN THE COUGAR CAMPUS, where his father, Wayne, had been the men's tennis coach for nearly 20 years, and became the type of collegiate phenom that dominated for two years, went pro and was spectacular enough to be connected to the Los Angeles school again on May 20 with an induction into the Intercollegiate Tennis Association hall of fame.
Those days as a Bruin still bring a smile to Pearce, who now happens to have just finished another year coaching -- at BYU.
"I had a few great wins, a few good days in the sun," Pearce said. "I'm not retired on the beach somewhere with a bunch of Grand Slam trophies, but I think I found the next best thing: Still being on the court."
Doing that as a player, in college, was basically the last time the sport came so easy to him.
More succinctly, it was the final two years when tennis was the biggest concern in his life.
There were good days ahead, sure, as he made a living from tennis. He played nine professional seasons after being a phenom at UCLA, where he was a two-time first-team All-American, singles & doubles (1985-1986), making a name for himself in the prestigious Pac-10 Conference. (UCLA, USC and Stanford are still annual powerhouses.)
Tennis trekked him to every continent but Antarctica -- a "bucket list" trip, he says, that will be made sometime -- and he experienced the cheers and fame of playing on the hallowed Centre Court of Wimbledon.
That was 1990, his finest hour just four years after leaving UCLA. The world looked bright again, his focus pure, as Pearce met Ivan Lendl in the most famous stadium in the sport.
Pearce's mother died shortly after he turned professional, which derailed the selfish focus required to reach the pinnacle of a sport like tennis. Pearce had also started a family with his wife, Cindi, whom he met in high school.
The match in England against Lendl was a coming-out party for his game. And it happened on July 4 as well, meaning a national television audience at home could turn on NBC and see an American patriotic tribute to a man who is still one of just 16 Americans to reach the quarterfinals in the grass-court tournament in the past 23 years.
Watch the footage, and yes, that's Jimmy Connors and Dick Enberg raving about the opportunity created by a baby-faced tactician from some place called Provo, Utah.
Pearce wound up narrowly losing the first two sets, then took the third on two of the best points of his life. He hit a running volley from about mid-court to stun Lendl -- at that time, to his sport what Michael Jordan was in his prime of basketball -- and then hit a beautiful backhand serve return to take the set, 7-5.
Pearce has a seven-minute DVD compilation of that day, but still can't stomach watching the whole match. He lost the fourth set, at one point feeling that a bad line-judge call turned momentum. (Video review was still just a twinkle in tennis's eye.)
Pearce wound up reaching a best ranking of No. 71 and was also capable in doubles. He would win four ATP Tour titles.
He was inducted into the college hall of fame recently, joining a prominent list of Bruin alumni like Connors and Arthur Ashe -- two names that made Pearce's decision to go to Westwood an easy one. By then, his father had retired from coaching.
Now Pearce gets the best of two worlds, he says. He is the head coach who has followed in his father's footsteps and also made a sport for his six children. (The Pearces' son John played No. 1 singles as a freshman this season for Timpview and advanced to the Class 4A state semifinals.)
And his Cougar teams also routinely play at UCLA, where he is still friends with Billy Martin, the Bruin head coach who was an assistant when Pearce matriculated.
An annual joy for Pearce is to hit Westwood Village with his current teams and take them to the same cookie shop where he would get his chocolate-chip fix when he was their age. Cookies then were four plus a milk for a buck. Now, it's still three and a wash-down, for only a quarter more.
Pearce had to be removed from the college game 15 years before his former coach at UCLA, Glenn Bassett, could nominate him. Pearce went to College Station, Texas, for the induction ceremony.
"All I can say was that it was a humbling experience," Pearce said. "To be connected with some people that, the overriding feeling is one of humility to be included. There are so many people involved that I looked up to, just like a lot of tennis players do."
