Men's and Women's Tennis Head Coach Mike Mucci enters his third spring season with the Gamecocks during the 2023 campaign. Mucci was named the head coach for the men’s and women’s tennis programs by Athletics Director Greg Seitz on Dec. 1, 2020.
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Mucci led the men’s and women’s tennis programs to 15 combined wins in the Spring of 2022. The Gamecock men went 8-10 overall and scored three league triumphs in its first season back in the ASUN Conference. Jacksonville State qualified for the ASUN Tournament before falling to eventual conference champions Liberty. The women’s team also had an impressive Spring, finishing with seven victories and three wins in conference action.
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Along with the tennis programs’ accolades on the court, Mucci produced a pair of strong recruiting classes following the 2022 campaign. He inked the seventh-best men’s tennis recruiting class among all mid-majors according to the Tennis Recruiting Network (TRN), shattering previous program high-marks, and Jax State women’s tennis signed the 16th-best class among mid-majors. Matei Palcau (no. 27 ranked TRN player) and Serafima Shastova (no. 38 per TRN), two gems signed in the Class of 2022, are among the highest-ranked prospects to ever sign with Jacksonville State tennis.
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After arriving in December of 2020, Mucci led the men's program to a 10-7 record and a 4-1 mark in the Ohio Valley Conference. He also led the women's side to nine wins in year one, including four in league competition. Mucci featured four All-Conference selections in his first year with the Gamecocks as Maj Tomac and Jaoquin Vallejo earned First Team All-OVC honors while Aljaz Kaplja was named to the All-OVC Second Team. On the women's side, Harriet Hamilton was named a First Team All-OVC selection. In addition, Tomac was deemed the OVC’s Men’s Tennis Freshman of the Year.
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Prior to joining Jacksonville State’s programs, Mucci served as the head women’s tennis coach for two seasons at Southern Utah University. The Thunderbirds went 13-11 overall and 5-5 in league play in his first season at the helm, advancing all the way to the Big Sky Conference Semifinals in 2019. SUU played a gauntlet of a non-conference schedule in his second year in Cedar City, Utah, and posted three wins before the COVID-19 Pandemic forced a cancellation of most of the 2020 season. Southern Utah voted to discontinue its tennis programs that June.
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During his quick stint at SUU, Mucci recruited numerous UTR 9 players while strengthening the Thunderbirds' schedule to a more competitive level. He also had several players selected to the Big Sky All-Academic Team during the COVID-shortened season.
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Furthermore, Mucci brings experience in the Ohio Valley Conference. He served as an assistant coach at Belmont University in 2018-19, where he helped the Bruins women's squad to its most wins in a season in over 15 years. In addition, Mucci coached the men's doubles team of Marko Ilic and Hendrik Inno to the Round of 16 in the NCAA Championships and helped them garner a national ranking of no. 8 by the Intercollegiate Tennis Association (ITA).
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Prior to his time at Belmont, Mucci was an assistant coach for the men's tennis program at the University of Delaware during the 2017-18 season. He led the Blue Hens to a 17-8 record, their best mark in 44 years. The team opened the season with its best start in 22 years by going 9-2 and won seven straight matches for the first time in 18 years.
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His coaching career started at his alma mater of Niagara University in New York, where he was the head men's and women's tennis coach from July of 2015 to December of 2016. He took over the Purple Eagles programs two years after his playing career at NU ended.
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He was a student athlete at Niagara from 2010-13, where he competed against some of the world's top juniors and collegiate players while earning ITA Scholar-Athlete honors in 2012 and 2013.
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Mucci also served as a tennis professional at Village Glen Tennis Club in Williamsville, N.Y., and at the Tennis Club of Rochester in Pittsford, N.Y.
