Bio
Debbie Southern led Furman's women's tennis program to unprecedented heights during her 31-year tenure. Southern guided the Paladins to 461 overall wins and a 213-22 SoCon record (.906 winning percentage) prior to her retirement in 2015, including a streak of 100 consecutive league wins from 1998-2010, a streak that has never been matched in any league sport.
She coached Furman to 19 regular-season SoCon titles, 16 league tournament titles and nine NCAA berths. She was a 14-time SoCon Coach of the Year and saw her players earn 14 SoCon Player of the Year awards, including four-time winner Megan Dunigan, who was a member of the SoCon's inaugural Hall of Fame class in 2009.
Southern coached nine SoCon Freshman of the Year award winners, five SoCon Sportsmanship Award winners, 12 SoCon Championship Most Outstanding Players and more than 150 All-SoCon selections. She also coached 33 individual and 16 doubles champions from 1985-97 before the SoCon Championship changed from an individual to a team scoring format.
In 2000, she became the first person to earn the South Carolina Tennis Association Coach of the Year award on two separate occasions (1991, 2000). Southern was inducted into the South Carolina Tennis Hall of Fame in 2004, the ITA Women's Collegiate Tennis Hall of Fame, along with her late father and her mother, in 2012, and the Furman Athletics Hall of Fame in 2013.