College of Staten Island Athletics

From the time he was big enough to carry a racquet, all Bruce Knittle ever wanted to do was be around tennis.  For over a decade,  he did it on the sidelines with the CSI men’s and women’s tennis teams turning the sport at the College into one of the premiere programs in the conference and region.  The coach made it a point to develop a family environment around tennis, taking great pride in teaching the game; turning beginners into champions, and making champions elite.

Knittle started as a tennis standout at Florida State University where he was later an assistant coach.  As a junior, he defeated tennis legend John McEnroe on the way to a successful playing career.  He eventually found his calling in coaching, and in 1992 joined the Dolphins just weeks before the men’s tennis season.  The Dolphins earned a tournament runner-up trophy in his inaugural season.  A year later, Knittle took a team that had won two CUNYAC Championships over the previous 9 years, and won the first of three-straight CUNYAC crowns with the men.  After failing to win the title in 1996, Knittle again orchestrated a CUNYAC three-peat, going an unblemished 19-0 within the CUNYAC over that span.  In his final four years with the College, Knittle won another pair of titles.  At the close of the 2003 season, he left CSI on top, compiling a staggering eight CUNYAC titles in 12 seasons, the most by any CSI coach in any sport.  To date, CSI has not won a men’s title since, an indicator to the legacy he left behind.

On the women’s side, Knittle inherited a team in the fall of 1992 that was forced to disband its program just two years earlier.  By 1993 Knittle guided the Dolphins to the first of four-straight 2nd-place finishes in the CUNYAC Tournament.  The frustration of coming so close but never winning was finally spelled in 1998, when the Dolphins won the first of back-to-back titles. Across both platforms, CSI took a championship or placed as runner-up 19 times in his 24 combined seasons.  

A community leader, Knittle also founded and operated the Bruce Knittle Boys and Girls Tennis Camps at the College of Staten Island that ran at the College from 1995-2003.