Oxford College of Emory University Men’s and Women’s Tennis Head Coach Pernilla Hardin, who spent her career mentoring young athletes and led the Eagles to 14 consecutive National Junior College Athletic Association (NJCAA) Division III titles from 2015 to 2023, died on July 2 after a six-year battle with ovarian cancer.
She was 62 years old and is survived by her husband of 38 years, Robert, and her children, Maria, Jeremiah and Anna.
Pernilla was born in 1961 in Hudiksvall, Sweden before moving to the United States in 1981. She would go on to lead a decorated coaching career, being inducted into the Georgia Collegiate Athletic Association Athletic Hall of Fame and being named NJCAA Coach of The Year nine times.
Athletic career
Pernilla attended Florida Junior College — which has since been renamed to Florida State College at Jacksonville — on a tennis scholarship. While at Florida Junior College, Pernilla maintained a 27-0 record. She then played her remaining two years of NCAA Division I (DI) tennis at the University of North Florida (UNF).
In a goodbye letter provided along with her obituary, Pernilla said she first acknowledged her Christian faith after her brother’s death, which occurred while she was in college. Her devotion to religion subsequently became a central part in her life.
“When I went to America for college, a new chapter in my life started,” Pernilla wrote. “My brother, Peter, died of an aneurysm in January 1982. It set my life on a new path. I discovered there are more things in life than fun and play. I was wondering why Peter died and I lived. That led me to find Jesus. The summer of 1983, I accepted Jesus Christ as my Lord and Savior. That is the best decision I have ever made.”
As a DI athlete, Pernilla won a state singles championship to help lead UNF to No. 2 and No. 3 national finishes in 1983 and 1984, respectively. She also received the Intercollegiate Tennis Association’s National Association of Intercollegiate Athletics Arthur Ashe Jr. Leadership and Sportsmanship Award.
Pernilla’s future husband, Robert, also played tennis for UNF’s men’s team. The pair met in 1982 and married each other in 1985.
After receiving a Bachelor of Science in health, Pernilla took care of her child as a stay-at-home mom as well as coached for the UNF women’s tennis team in 1989. Pernilla and her family later moved to the Atlanta Metropolitan Area.
Pernilla began working as a residential director for Gordon State College (Ga.) in 2012 but dreamed of one day coaching a college tennis team again, Gwendolyn Blount, Oxford men’s and women’s tennis assistant coach, said. Blount said that Pernilla used “faith” to guide herself toward this dream.
“She always hoped and prayed that after her kids were grown that she would have an opportunity to be a college coach because that was her dream,” Blount said.
Pernilla Hardin served as the Head Men's and Women's Tennis Coach at Oxford College for 10 years. Courtesy of Oxford Athletics
Legacy at Oxford
Pernilla eventually found a job posting for a men’s and women’s tennis coach at Oxford in 2013. Oxford Athletic Director Roderick Stubbs offered her an interim coaching position to replace Judy Greer, who had recently retired from coaching men’s and women’s tennis at Oxford. Pernilla ultimately accepted a full-time coaching position in 2013.
Blount, who met Pernilla in 2013, recalled that her first impression of Pernilla was that she was “passionate.”
Frank Lu (22Ox, 24C), who captained for the Eagles in 2021, expressed a similar sentiment and said Pernilla’s passion for tennis and victory translated to coaching.
“She was definitely a fighter,” Lu said. “She was very calm on the outside, and you might not be able to tell at a glance. And she was, obviously, extremely kind and fair to every player she met, but she loved to win. You can see in her eyes, she had a fire behind it every single time she'd step on the court, she started coaching.”
Lu attributed the team’s success to Pernilla being an “efficient” communicator.
“She was always honest,” Lu said. “If we’re having a problem, she was not gonna just tell us to do a certain adjustment without explaining to us why. She always backed up her explanations with theory, just so we’d understand.”
Pernilla coordinated team trips to her lake house before national championships so the athletes could ride on jet skis and “let loose,” Lu added. She also had “rituals” to promote organization and team bonding on campus, like stretching the same way before each practice and eating together as a team afterward.
Pernilla’s attitude toward building camaraderie provided an opportunity to rekindle Oxford’s tennis culture, which Lu said was hurt by COVID-19.
“When COVID stopped play for two years, you lose all of that team and have a feeling of starting from scratch,” Lu said. “She put in effort to keep that going. So she was doing her best to introduce us to that team culture, to give us that same experience, despite not having any legacy from other players.”
Moreover, Emily Freestone (23Ox, 25C) said her relationship with Pernilla transcended tennis, as she provided support for problems off the courts.
“I would go to her for school problems and some other problems as well,” Freestone said. “She was really good at … giving you support.”
Pernilla battled cancer several times throughout her career at Emory, first undergoing several surgeries to remove tumors from her stomach in 2015. Pernilla’s cancer returned in 2018, and she underwent chemotherapy until March 2020, a couple of months after she was diagnosed with 13 tumors.
Lu and Freestone said that the disease did not stop Pernilla from coaching them to the best of her ability. Freestone, who was a captain for the Eagles last season, noted that Pernilla’s passion and competitive vim inspired her players to be resilient, even through adversity.
“Her perseverance, for sure, and her leadership … those are two that I feel like really impacted me,” Freestone said. “She taught me how to fight through obstacles.”
As Pernilla battled with aggressive ovarian cancer for the second time after relapsing in 2018, the team came together and used her resilience as motivation to work harder, Lu said.
“She’s putting in all that effort,” Lu said. “We really saw her as a role model in that way, where we would put our head down and grind because that’s what she’s doing.”
Lu added that Pernilla’s legacy is “unmatched” and that she helped the program grow by demonstrating the importance of playing for Oxford tennis.
“We’ve been doing well for years, and it can be attributed to coach, with her style of working hard,” Lu said. “She was able to get the players motivated. She was able to make you want to want it, which is something very difficult for a lot of coaches to do for any program.”
