Gene Cantin
Gene Cantin - A Tennis Life
By Bill Simons
simons@insidetennis.com
March 2021
Gene Cantin had a slight smile, yet it beamed. He was a tall, quiet, smart man with a certain dignified presence. You couldn’t miss him. Plus, he was good – real good – at tennis. He won tournaments from Israel to the Bay Area. A prime disciple of the singular Bay Area teaching master Tom Stow, Cantin was a longtime San Rafael resident who taught for decades in Marin. Sadly, on February 26, at 77, he passed away due to a brain hemorrhage. A leader on Chet Murphy’s teams at UC Berkeley, he was a longtime and popular member of the Berkeley Tennis Club, where he once took a set off of Stan Smith. He also was the author of Topspin to Better Tennis and a knowing tennis historian. When the selection committee of the NorCal Tennis Hall of Fame wanted data, Gene was their go-to guy for years. As Gene’s friend Steve Cornell, noted, “He was a gentle man.