The 10th Annual Austin Tennis Academy Grand Slam Shootout was a tremendous success on all fronts. The event started Saturday night October 16, 2010 with a party and Calcutta Auction held at the Spanish Oaks Outdoor Pavilion. The party featured delicious catering by 2 Dine 4, open bar, live music, and silent and live auctions. ATA CEO Jack Newman was the master of ceremony for the evening and started with honoring the ATA STARS. Here are his remarks:

“The formation, expansion and success of any organization or business and by extension any community is built upon the people who influence its birth and growth. This evening we would like to honor some folks who were instrumental, in varying ways to the foundation of the Austin Tennis Academy and the Austin Athletic Scholarship Foundation or who are instrumental today in our success.

Each of these people or couples are like characters in a play.

Next on the program was fundraising for the Austin Athletic Scholarship Foundation.

The Austin Athletic Scholarship Foundation assists those who need assistance in paying for the high cost of junior tennis training and associated travel.

Steve Huber of Wilson Racquet Sports spoke about Wilson’s relationship with the ATA and donated a check for $1000 to the Austin Athletic Scholarship Foundation.

Brandon Davis and Santiago Montoya and a host of alumni came on stage to present a check for over $4000 to the Austin Athletic Scholarship Foundation. It was a tremendous showing of former ATA players who also served as Captains of their college teams, plus Full Scholar and Duke Class President Kendall Dabaghi to round it out.

Just to name a few:

Brandon Davis – University of Illinois – Captain of his team

Santiago Montoya – Notre Dame – Captain of his team

Whitney Waters – University of the Redlands – Captain of her team

Brent Werbeck – Boise State – Captain of his team

Adam Slagter – Penn State – Captain of his team

Matthew Bain – Texas A&M – Captain of his team

Jenn Wencel Werbeck – Boise State – Captain of her team

Roger Gubser – The University of Texas – Captain of his team

Tres Davis – Texas A&M – Not Captain, but went on to play pro tennis

Kendall Dabaghi – Duke – Not Captain, but was President of his Class and Fulbright Scholar

Also, Grant Wilson (Alabama), Jonathan Stockdale (St. Edwards’s), Mary Bain (St. Edwards’s, Dillon Walker (University of Virginia)

The Berber family, including Santiago Montoya, then honored Jack Newman for his leadership and character, which has inspired so many of his players and has driven the entire ATA culture. Grace London (Schmidhauser) sang a song about a hero, which was inspired by Jack Newman.

Grace sang a 3 song set, including her own composition, and blew the crowd away with her rock n’ rolling and poise on stage. Two private Grace London concerts were sold as live Auction items.

CEO Jack Newman Auctioned off Calcutta Tournament teams and then showed a video that played on Fox Sports Southwest (6 states, 10 million viewers) about the ATA Water Walk. He asked Breck Spencer to come up and talk about his experiences in Ethiopia and the ATA water walk that he organized.

Coach Newman then introduced Kendall Dabaghi, brother of the late Cameron Dabaghi, to talk about Cameron and the formation of the Cameron Dabaghi Scholarship.

Coach Newman’s remarks regarding the Cameron Dabaghi Scholarship:

“The AASF was founded to help support athletes who are pursuing a disciplined lifestyle to reach their highest level of accomplishment. The AASF is dedicated to serving students who need help to accomplish their goals. This help comes in the form of travel and/or training grants to allow players to reach their full potential. Additionally the AASF looks for players to help who have a spirit of giving back themselves. We are attempting to help players who will go on to be good citizens. The proceeds from this event will support the work of the Austin Athletic Scholarship Foundation.

This evening is special in that we are inaugurating a new named scholarship. The first annual Cameron Dabaghi Scholarship/AASF will be awarded this evening. To talk to you about this scholarship I would like to ask Alumni Kendall Dabaghi to come forward.

Cameron had an amazing intellect. I can remember a conversation we had when he was in 6th or 7th grade about the question of whether Humans were the only animals with speech. We talked over the course of a few months about dolphins and whales and I can remember a passionate argument about Koko, a gorilla who had been taught American Sign Language. Cameron had a mind that worked so fast that it might have seemed to him that the world moved in slow motion.

Cameron had an amazing passion for tennis. I think it perplexed him that he could not master the game as easily as some academic subjects he studied. He worked hard in tennis and loved striking the ball. He always seemed surprised that the ball did not do what he wanted it to do.”

“This year’s winner of the Cameron Dabaghi Scholarship of $2500 is Taylor Shamshiri. Taylor is a senior at ATA. Taylor is a national merit scholar semifinalist and has a straight A average. He is applying to Ivy League colleges and his first choice is Coach Eric Schmidhasuer’s alma matre, Davidson College. In addition to being a great student and a national level tennis competitor, Taylor helps coach our junior development and junior academy program. And, he works 2 hours every afternoon in the ATA pro-shop. Taylor has grown tremendous as part of the ATA program, both as a tennis player and as a person. We are incredibly proud to have him be the first recipient of this award.”

The party ended with a surprise anonymous donation of a Cadillac Escalade, which the Foundation will sell for the proceeds.

On Sunday, the event moved to John and Sheryl Scott’s club, Lakecliff Racquet Club. This beautiful facility features 5 hard courts, 2 red clay and 1 grass court. The eight Calcutta teams battled it out in two round robin groups to begin with ,and the winner of each round robin played off in the finals.

Finalists Teams by line:

Carla Rosenberg Kendall Brooks

Steve Barth Doug Davis

Kathy Chaffee Tommy Collins

Mary Anne McKenzie Eliot Blatt

Kim Fossum Liam Leddy

Toby Neugebauer Tres Davis

David Steinwedell Rob Steinwedell

Mike Qualls John Schoenmakers

Jeannette Murphy Payton Holden

Joe Osborn Austin Mayo

Toby Neugebauer’s and Tres Davis’ team ended up winning in the finals 3-2. There was plenty of fun tennis during the afternoon, including lots of trash-talk between teams, and of course, lots of use of game and point chips to even the lineups and score.

The 10th annual ATA Grand Slam Shootout was considered the best event of the 10 years by those who have participated in past events. The addition of an Alumni group was especially noted as a big part of the success of this year’s event. The ATA staff is looking forward to making next years events even better.