BOULDER — They still remember when their coach bought the team ice cream cones.
That’s when Judy Sigel Freeman and Jill Sigel Greer — identical twins who showed up at the University of Colorado in 1971 with absolutely no thought of actually playing tennis for the Buffaloes — knew they’d “hit the jackpot.”
“It was so amazing to us that someone would buy us something to eat because we played tennis for CU,” recalled Jill. “We looked at each other and said we’ve died and gone to heaven.”
Maybe not actually heaven. But with the recently enacted Title IX legislation newly in place and Colorado sponsoring a women’s tennis program, Boulder was close enough in 1972.
Close enough, anyway, that the circumstances that swept Judy and Jill up when they arrived at CU changed the course of their lives in ways they could never have imagined.
“CU allowed us to grow,” Judy said. “Title IX gave us a chance and CU changed our lives. We just caught the wave and rode it.”
Indeed, it is hard to fathom the convergence of coincidence that came together to produce such an impact on their lives.
Judy and Jill Sigel grew up in a Minneapolis suburb during an era when high schools didn’t sponsor girls sports. The two had played tennis together throughout their youth — but never had the chance to play on a team or have the “luxury” of an actual coach.
“We watched how other people played,” Judy said. “That’s how we learned. We played with each other and learned from that.”
Not that they didn’t take the opportunity to give themselves some competition whenever possible. They spent as much time as they could at local city courts, where they played anybody and everybody who showed up.
“We were kind of hustlers,” Jill said with a laugh. “You could play and if you won you held the court. We’d play the guys, win the court and hold it all day. We were always coming home late because we didn’t want to give up our court.”
But that was basically the extent of their tennis competition. Women’s college teams were few and far between, “recruiting” was unheard of — and besides, Jill and Judy had no real competitive resumé.
Thus, upon graduation from St. Louis Park High School, the two decided to attend Colorado “because we both loved to ski.”
Then their lives took some twists and turns they could never have envisioned.
“We…
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