Harkins serves double duty as head coach of Nicholls’ men’s and women’s tennis teams

Where others may perceive as challenges, Greg Harkins views as acceptance.

A case in point is that Harkins has served as head coach of both the men’s and women’s teams tennis teams since 2016.

“I’ll be honest, it’s not the norm in Division I in today’s world, but it’s the way the cards are dealt,” Harkins said.

Like any good card player, Harkins tries to take advantage of the hand he’s been dealt.

“We kind of combine both the teams in terms of practice and a lot of times in travel,” Harkins said. “We kind of try to look at it as one big family.

“The way I approach it – and yes, it is challenging sometimes – but you know about four years ago we hired our first full time assistant in the history of the program. Being able to stabilize that position helped give me a little more flexibility as well, so that when we’re working practices, basically we just turned it into a big family and there’s more infrastructure because both teams can support each other.

Harkins has had a partner at the card table since 2018. That was when Tavis Rieger was hired as an assistant coach for both programs. Rieger was promoted to associate head coach in 2022.

Tavis Rieger was hired as assistant coach for the Nicholls women’s and men’s tennis programs in December of 2018 before being promoted to associate head coach in 2022. 

With one staff coaching two programs, Harkins to schedule matches, both home and on the road, so the men and women can play at the same venue. There are times, however, when that’s not possible.

“We’ll divvy up those duties,” Harkins explained. “The reality of it is we couldn’t do that in the past (without having an assistant coach). He may take off and go in one direction and I’ll go in another.”

Nicholls may not have the athletic budget of larger schools, causing some observers to overlook the program’s status, according to Harkins.

“Look, a lot of people don’t realize we’re Division I. We’re big-time college sports,” the Nicholls coach said. “We’re classified as a mid-major, but we play Power-5 schools. We’ve played big schools across the board.

“There’re no easy matches at this level. If on some days the men got to go one direction, women the other, that’s the great thing we can do. We just get in the van and grind it out.”

Harkins’ first coaching job was as an assistant for the men’s and women’s programs at the College of Charleston.

He gained valuable insight in having to manage both programs, but more than the dual coaching roles in his development, was what he learned from his coaches he played and worked under along the way, such as Angelo Anastopoulo, Chuck McCuen and Jay Bruner, Harkins said.

“What helps me more than anything is my coaches and my mentors. I just use what I learned from them and seeing how they manage themselves,” said Harkins. “Those two guys, Coach Anastopoulo and Coach McCuen are two of the most successful coaches in Division I history. I was very lucky to spend a lot of time with those guys. Coach (Jay) Bruner on the men’s side at College of Charleston had a lot of success, too. It just shows you what you have to do on a day-to-day basis.”

“I had a lot of the skill sets, being a lifelong player and then working in player development for the USTA and then working my way up through the club ranks and things like that, once I transition to college is just having a pretty good handle on the administrative side,” he continued. “I’ve worked in business and in areas like that.

“I think it’s just watching them and seeing how the things that they did and then applying that to where we are in the world that we live in.”

Anastopoulo, Harkins’ mentor as the women’s coach at the College of Charleston, is one the winningest coaches in Division I history.

“He helped me learn how to recruit to the best of our abilities,” Harkins said. “I don’t want to say it was a little bit of old-school mentality, but that’s kind of the era that we grew up in. We roll up our sleeves, we get out on the road, we spend nights in the car going to see recruits, things like that,” Harkins said.

“It’s a lot of good discipline from that side and really having to build the relationships with recruits and make sure that we maintain the integrity of the program and Coach Bruner on the men’s side, he was very successful.”

Harkins played for McCuen at Georgia State.

“He and I grew up in the same neighborhood in Atlanta,” Harkins revealed. “We were two of seven boys who went on to play collegiate tennis. Coach McCuen eventually worked his way up to become the head coach at Clemson, which is a perennial Top 25 university.”

One of McCuen’s main attributes, Harkins said, was his ability to get things done.

“He was an even-tempered man,” Harkins said. “He always tried to find a solution to things.

“He was just a good guy. We all grew up together in the same neighborhood. We all went down to the courts and played tennis. When it came time for me to play, he said, ‘come on. Come play for me.’”

Following his stint at the College of Charleston, Harkins gained his first head coaching position, guiding the women’s team at the University of Louisiana at Lafayette.

“It was a great opportunity to learn and to grow. We (ULL and Nicholls) crossed paths a lot. We played them a lot in the last few years over here. It’s just a different setup than Lafayette versus Down the Bayou.

“Lafayette was no complaints. We had a great schedule. We were able to recruit good players. It’s just a bigger school. That’s all it is. Nothing more than that.”

When Harkins first arrived, there seemed to be a few cards missing from the deck he was handed.

“When I got here, I didn’t have a full squad on either side,” Harkins recalled. “I had five guys using two tennis rackets. On the women’s side, I didn’t even have a full roster.

“I’ll be honest, I kind of took a deep breath when I first got here, but (felt like) ‘that’s OK because it’s a totally fresh start and we build from the bottom and build our way up.’

His teams, Harkins said, have shown improvement on the court and in the classroom over the years.

“Where we are today compared to where we were…I’m starting my eighth season now. It’s unbelievable the level of success the kids have had on the court, but off the court.

A total of nine members of Nicholls tennis program were named Intercollegiate Tennis Association Scholar-Athletes for their excellence in the classroom earlier this year. For the seventh straight year, the women’s squad received All-Academic Team, as the Intercollegiate honors.

The women’s team had six selections on the ITA list and finished with a cumulative 3.785 GPA for the academic year. The Individuals named to the academic list were Carla Bouygues, Constanza Crus, Laura Lopez, Simona Maksimovic, Noemie Piquet, and Sophia Sara Safarova.

The men’s honorees were Wout Doumen, Vladislav Gorbatenko, and Quentin Lamothe.

Entering his eighth year, Harkins is now among the elder statesmen among Nicholls coaches. With that comes a sense of serenity.

“I’m 30 years in coaching, so for me, wherever we go and whatever we do, down here on the bayou is my home. I’m not chasing the grill to go somewhere else. We want to make this the best that we can.”