In 1993, Dave Hagymas got some good news. One of his best friends was leaving Duke.
But that wasn't the part that made Hagymas the most excited. His friend, who was soon to be a former assistant coach of the women's tennis team, had recommended Hagymas to take his place.
Thus, only four years after graduating from Coastal Carolina with a bachelors degree in physical education, the young Hagymas, whose previous coaching experience included only high school and an assistant position with his alma mater, had gotten a big break and was going to coach with one of the top five programs in the country.
A year later, after a tumultuous off-court season in which Hagymas had differences with then women's tennis coach Geoff Macdonald, things were not looking bright. It was then that his second opportunity in as many years arose, when friend and men's tennis coach Jay Lapidus asked Hagymas to cross programs and coach with him on the men's side.
Eight years later the pair remains together. And unless an amazing job opens up for the national assistant coach of the year, they probably won't split up anytime soon.
"Working with the women was a difficult, not because of the program, but because of some off-court problems," Hagymas said from Camp Laurel near Kent's Hill, Maine where he works as a tennis instructor during the summer. "Fortunately Jay threw me a life line. He's been great to work with. He's been like a dad, a brother and a best friend all at one time. I think its one of the unique relationships in the sport between assistant and head coaches. It's one of the reasons why I could stay here and not take [just any head coaching job] for a while. It allows me to pick and choose."
Lapidus echoed his assistants sentiments and added that Hagymas' personality not only fits in well with his own, but also with those of his players.
"Dave's been a good friend to me," Lapidus said. "He's definitely one of my better friends in the area, in the Duke community. He's good friends with the players.... He's one of those guys you can talk to, who's easy going, and he's a warm person to all the people whom he associates with. He has a very good style of communication which the kids really like."
Hagymas also has some of the same type of freedom with his job in running the team. Not only does he serve as a good mediator between Lapidus and his players, he also runs the show himself during many fall tournaments, acting as the head coach when Lapidus himself can't go.
"By now I know that he trusts me," Hagymas said. "He's always given me a lot of freedom because he knows I can do a good job and pretty much follow the same philosophy."
Following Lapidus' philosophy and learning from him has taken the Albany native to the top of his profession. This rise recently culminated in Hagymas' being named national assistant coach of the year by a committee of his peers. The award came as quite a shock to Hagymas, who didn't think he was eligible since he had not been named regional assistant of the year, an award he won in its inauguration four years ago.
"I was really excited to win," Hagymas said. "It's a real nice honor, and it's a nice award as well. It's good for them to recognize assistants too."
Hagymas, however, will probably not be an assistant for long. As he said, his job and standing amongst collegiate coaches allows him the freedom to chose where he goes next. He's not incredibly keen on leaving the area since his wife has a sound job, but don't expect him to sit in Durham behind Lapidus forever.
"Eventually I'm sure Dave has aspirations to move on to a head coaching role, but at this point I'm sure he's pretty happy with the way his situation is," Lapidus said. "He's also the director of the indoor facility here, so that helped his salary quite a bit and put him in a more comfortable financial position. For now, I think he's pretty content."
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