Hall of Fame: Tennis standout Gidley credits Abilenians for helping her to excel

EDITOR'S NOTE: Today continues a series of stories on the 2023 inductees into the Big Country Athletic Hall of Fame. Coming Friday is Hugh Sandifer, the now retired, longtime Wylie ISD football and basketball coach and athletic director.

For 25 years, Kim Gidley has coached the women's tennis team at Air Force.

Her induction Monday into the Big Country Athletic Hall of Fame caused her to reflect on how she made her way to Colorado Springs to coach a Division I program.

"It's beyond huge," she said of being honored, "because that is where everything started for me. Being from Abilene and just having the honor with all kinds of coaches from there is pretty cool.

"Anytime your get honored for what you do is a huge deal."

Gidley quickly landed on her experience growing up in Abilene. The coaches she had here and others were willing to hit balls with a teenage girl who only picked up a racquet as a seventh-grader. She quickly showed the skills and determination to excel.

"She never quits. When I think of Kim Gidley, that's what I think of," said longtime friend Catherine Wilson. They hit balls as kids, beginning one hot summer day when no else was foolish enough to play - and remain close today.

"Our friendship has withstood time," Wilson told the Reporter-News in 2021.

More: 'Someone who never quits': Catching up on Kim Gidley's challenges and successes

Gidley might not have been a tennis player if she had lived a block or two from where she did in south Abilene.

Instead of joining her friends at Jefferson Junior High, she went to Lincoln, where she knew no one. Well, one other girl from Alta Vista Elementary. That girl's mother - Lisa Roberts' mom is all Gidley can remember - was a volunteer coach at Lincoln and she suggested young Kim play tennis with her daughter. She'd have one girl pal.

"That's the only reason I play tennis," Gidley said, laughing.

"I had planned to be a basketball player."

Gidley's trek to the hall

Gidley starred at Abilene High, playing in the UIL state tournament and graduating in 1983. She was named the school's top female athlete that year.

In 1984, she was invited to the U.S. Olympic Trials.

She played tennis collegiately at now-Texas State, Midland College and then at Abilene Christian, which qualified for the NCAA Division II tournament .

Along the way, she blew out a knee and needed total reconstruction.

She finished college at Southern Illinois, and helped lead her team to the 1989 Division II national championship. She attained a No. 3 national ranking but her calling was to coach.

"She was born to be a coach," Wilson said. Her friend was all about strategy on the court.

Gidley returned to AHS, where she coached from 1990-97, taking over as head coach in 1993. The 1991 Eagles won the Class 5A state title.

Considering a collegiate job, she got an assistant coach's job at Idaho, while working on her Ph.D.

Then came an offer out of the wild blue yonder to coach at Air Force. She accepted the job, making her dad, a 22-year Air Force veteran, proud. The Air Force brought her family to Abilene.

Gidley figured she'd give it a few years, but she got that Rocky Mountain high.

She's still there, coaching a successful team despite facing opponents with lineups dominated by international players. That is not what the academy does.

"We've only played (against) two Americans in the 10 matches that we've played," she said.

In mid-April, Air Force was playing Wyoming for the top spot in the Mountain West Conference. Her team lost and now stands in fourth place, but it owns wins over the top two teams, Fresno State and San Diego State. Of the 11 teams in the conference, five are nationally ranked. she said.

Her 338 wins is the most in school history. The program entered this season on a streak of 13 straight winning seasons.

Gidley always is around competitive tennis.

Abilene connections

There is a twist to Gidley's induction, proving again that it's a small world and Abilene may be the capital.

One of the colonels who hired Gidley, Col. Larry Fariss, was stationed at Dyess AFB and got to know Hugh Sandifer, who will be inducted Monday.

Fariss, who graduated from the academy, returned to coach football.

"Abilene definitely connected me to this job," she said, laughing.

Gidley named some of the coaches who had an impact on her.

Joe Williams, who was the teaching pro at Rose Park but coached her at Midland College.

Rick Meyers, who gave her lessons, and his twin brothers, Scott and David.

As a small world would have it, the Meyers family is being inducted at this year's banquet, too.

There's Wilson, who was up to playing in the rain. And a local banker, David Jones, who was willing to hit here.

"Here I was, this 15-, 16-year-old kid asking a grown man, 'Hey, practice with me."

David Zimmerman, the former Cooper standout who was going to law school, said yes when she asked him to play.

"It's not one person but the community. People gave their time and loved the sport," she said. "Rose Park Tennis Center literally was our home."

"I am definitely a product of the Abilene Tennis Association and the Abilene ISD," she said.

It was seventh-grade tennis that go her started, and she is grateful still for that chance. She was afforded the opportunity to play in tournaments thanks to the ATA.

"That helped me get good as quickly as I did. I loved tennis and I wanted to get good," Gidley said. "That takes time and effort and passion."

And that still holds true today. Gidley learned that first-hand in Abilene.

"Those two organizations gave me the opportunity to do everything that I've done in my career. Without those two, I definitely would not be where I'm at. "

Gidley recalls her seventh-grade coach, Gene Sheets, who learned to coach tennis from a book. What she learned from him that she carried with her was to learn and do something productive each day.

Lincoln did not have tennis courts. The kids were bused to Rose Park to practice.

When it rained, they worked hard in the gym on conditioning.

"That philosophy has stuck with me. That was a huge life lesson," she said. "My dad used to joke, 'Are you going to something different today?'"

Sherry Curnutt was Gidley's nine-grade coach, someone "who gave me the opportunity to be the best player in town."

Jerry Ticer was her coach at AHS, and another influence.

"I've wanted to coach since I was a sophomore in high school," said Gidley, who would coach Ticer's son and daughter.

She remembers thinking, as a teen, that she would like to live in a big city. But she realized Abilene, perhaps with fewer distractions, allowed her to focus on athletics. Because athletes here had to travel, they learned how to compete on the road.

"I think that is why for years, Abilene athletic programs excelled," she said. For a stretch, Abilene was dominant at even the state level in tennis, golf and baseball.

And now, one of those athletes from a dominate tennis era returns as a hall of famer.

This article originally appeared on Abilene Reporter-News: Hall of Fame: Tennis standout Gidley credits Abilenians for her success