Rafael Osuna (2007) - USC Athletics Hall of Fame

Rafael Osuna

Induction:
2007
Class:
1963

Rafael Osuna achieved success at the highest levels of the collegiate and international tennis worlds. He won the NCAA singles championship in 1962 and captured the NCAA doubles crown all 3 years (1961-63) that he lettered at USC. He helped the Trojans to the NCAA team title in both 1962 and 1963. Nicknamed “The Blur” because of his speed, the Mexico City native also won the singles at the U.S. Open in 1963 and the doubles at Wimbledon in 1960 and 1963 and at the U.S. Open in 1962. He was the first Mexican player ever ranked No. 1 in the world (1963). He was a key player on Mexico’s Davis Cup squads, as his country became the first from Central America to reach the finals (1962). At the 1968 Olympics, he won a gold medal in doubles. Tragically, he died at the age of 30 in a plane crash while on a business trip (he was a marketing director) on June 4, 1969, in Monterrey, Mexico, at the peak of his career...just a month after he helped Mexico stun powerful Australia in Davis Cup play. He was inducted into the inaugural class of the Intercollegiate Tennis Hall of Fame in 1983 and is also a member of the International Tennis Hall of Fame.