Phil Neer

Philip F. Neer (December 24, 1901^[1] in Portland, Oregon – December 1989^[2]) was NCAA champion and a top-ranking amateur tennis player in the 1920s.

Neer, a native of Portland,^[2] was one of the first male tennis players from the west coast to achieve national tennis success. He and partner Don Gilman won the Oregon state doubles championship in 1918,^[3] and in 1919, was the national junior doubles runner-up and the Pacific Northwest singles champion.^[4] A year later, he won the British Columbia men’s singles championship^[4] and the Oregon state singles championship.^[5]

Neer attended Stanford University and in 1921, became the first player from a western U.S. university to win the NCAA Men's Tennis Championship.^[6][7] A year later, Neer and partner Jim Davies won the NCAA doubles championship, the first team from a non-Ivy League school to do so.^[7]

Neer won back-to-back doubles championships at the Pacific Coast Championships in 1932 and 1933 and was runner-up in 1934. At the tournament now known as the Cincinnati Masters, Neer reached the semifinals in 1919 as a 17 year old.

On January 28, 1933, Neer, who was ranked #8 in the United States at the time, played his friend and occasional mixed doubles partner^[8] Helen Wills Moody in an exhibition match in San Francisco. Moody, who was the reigning ladies' Wimbledon champion, defeated Neer 6–3, 6–4.^[9][10] This match predated the Bobby Riggs-Billie Jean King "Battle of the Sexes" by 40 years.

Neer was inducted into the United States Tennis Association Pacific Northwest Hall of Fame in 2003,^[4] and is a member of the Stanford Athletic Hall of Fame.

Neer's brothers, Jacie and Henry, were also prominent in Portland tennis, as well as his nephew (Jacie's son) Jack Neer.^[11]