Julia Sell

Julia Sell has changed the culture of the LSU women’s tennis program and has helped lead the Lady Tigers back to national prominence on the recruiting trail and on the courts in four seasons as the head coach. In 2016, Julia Sell was joined by her husband Michael Sell as co-head coaches of the LSU women’s tennis team. Julia Sell spearheaded the signing of the top class in the country by tennisrecruiting.net. On the court, the squad started out strong with the program’s first appearance ever at the ITA Team Indoor Championships. At the championships, the team defeated ninth-ranked Oklahoma State for the fifth top-10 win in the last 24 seasons. The Lady Tigers broke the record for the highest ranking in school history on three separate occasions during the season. Prior to the 2016, the highest team ranking was 15th, but LSU went on to reach rankings of 14th, 13th and eventually ninth to shatter the record. Prior to LSU, Sell served as an assistant coach for Notre Dame for three years from September of 2008 until August of 2011. She helped propel the Irish to their best results in program history, back to back Final Four appearances in the NCAA Team Tournament and a No. 5 year end ranking in 2009 and 2010. While at Notre Dame, she helped the Irish capture three Big East titles as well as reaching the semifinals of the 2009 ITA National Team Indoor Championships. In May of 2010 Sell was selected as a coach for the USTA Summer Collegiate Team, which serves as an elite training program for the top American collegiate tennis players who are trying to make the transition into professional tennis. Sell got her start in coaching at the collegiate level in September of 2007 when she was named an assistant coach at Harvard. In her one season at Harvard, she helped recruit the nation’s seventh-best signing class in 2007 followed by the nation’s No. 2 rated class the following year. A 2003 graduate of the University of Florida, Sell served as team captain for the Gators from 2000-03 and played the No. 1 singles position for the 2003 National Championship Team. During her time in Gainesville, Florida won a national championship, two Southeastern conference championships, three SEC tournament championships and finished as the NCAA runner-up and National Team Indoor runner-up. She received Florida’s Most Improved Player award, the SEC Outstanding Senior award and was named the ITA South Region Player of the Year as a senior in 2003. The former Scaringe achieved a career- high ITA singles ranking of 24th and 7th in doubles.