Tom Lilly

Biography

The 2025-26 season marks Tom Lilly's 29th full season at the helm of Creighton’s women’s tennis program. Lilly has been a part of Bluejay tennis for 36 years. He spent five years as a player, redshirting one season and later served three years as an assistant coach for both the men's and women's teams. He took over as interim head coach in the spring of 1997. Lilly was later named head coach of both the men’s and women’s teams at the end of that season. Lilly served 26.5 years as the Bluejay head coach before stepping down on June 9, 2023. He owned a program-record 241 victories as the Bluejay men's head coach. In total, Lilly owns 553 wins (including 312 women's victories), which ranks fourth in the history in Creighton Athletics in all sports. Lilly picked up his 500th career triumph when the Creighton women beat Air Force on Jan. 28, 2023. In 2022-23, Lilly lead the Bluejays women's tennis team to a 17-8 overall record, the team's best record since 1993 when the team also finished with a 17 wins. CU earned earned the No. 3 seed at the BIG EAST Championships Presented by JEEP, where the Bluejays advanced to the finals for the first time in program history after earning a heroic 4-3 come-from-behind win over DePaul in the semifinals. Malvika Shukla earned First Team All-BIG EAST honors while Valerie Negin claimed Second Team All-BIG EAST honors. Tom and Jean Lilly were also named the BIG EAST Coaching Staff of the Year, marking the first time in league history a tennis coach