Jamie Hjort has seen a lot in his 12 years at the helm of Wood River tennis. But never this.
The longtime Wolverines coach watched firsthand as Ruby Campbell went from never having picked up a racquet to a collegiate tennis player at Rome City Institute in Italy—all in the span of two years.
“It’s a good surprise to have kids show up like that,” Hjort said. “There’s always a first, though, right?”
A tennis racquet, that is.
Campbell had been playing pickleball for years. It started with her dad. Around 2019, new courts were built near their house and the two of them decided to give this new sport a try.
“We tried it out and it was fun as a new hobby, even though we were terrible at it,” Campbell said with a laugh. “But we kept going out and got better. I kept beating my dad.”
He was the first of many.
She won the Sun Valley Pickleball Classic twice—taking the 3.5-4.0 skill level title in 2023 and the under-3.5 title in 2024—and entered bigger tournaments in Denver and Salt Lake City.
“Everyone in the community thought I was going to go pro,” she said.
But Campbell wanted more.
Something that pickleball—along with the 14 other sports she tried, from Alpine skiing and fencing to jujitsu and horseback riding—hadn’t quite been able to give her. A sense of belonging.
“I always wanted to be part of a team sport in high school,” she said. “So I was like, ‘Well, there’s tennis. It’s just a larger court.’”
Well, it wasn’t quite that easy.
Her first practices were a rude awakening. The biggest adjustment wasn’t the court or the movement—it was the power that tennis demands.
“I was hitting a lot of balls out,” she said. “I was just over-hitting. And then I was hitting a lot of balls into the net. I just didn’t have any power.”
While Campbell’s pickleball background gave her handy tools like court awareness and an instinct for angles, it doesn’t quite prepare you for the speed and power that tennis demands.
“She came out and she had some skills,” Hjort said. “She had the court placement, and some of the strokes were pretty close to being almost a tennis stroke. I knew there was potential there.”
He just didn’t know how much.
Determined to get better, Campbell spent the next three weeks putting in three to four hours a day outside of practice—sometimes as many as six days a week. The work paid off. She developed a formidable forehand—flat, hard and difficult to handle—and by the time the season was officially underway, she had claimed the No. 1 girls singles spot on the team.
“I was astonished,” she said. “I never thought I would get that role, especially going into varsity.”
It’s a role she never relinquished.
“She’s a great competitor and doesn’t like to lose,” Hjort said. “She competes all the way to the end.”
About the only thing Campbell didn’t do during her brief tenure was make it to state—falling in the district semifinals both years with a trip to the postseason just out of reach.
“I was really close,” she said.
But that didn’t stop her from getting an opportunity at the next level.
Now Campbell is trading Hailey for Rome, where she’ll play tennis for the Herons at Rome City Institute. The school is an American-style university built specifically for student-athletes, offering competitive programs in 11 sports alongside accredited degree programs.
She’ll study international business and train on the clay courts of Circolo Canottieri Lazio, a historic tennis club in the heart of Rome that has been a cornerstone of Italian sports culture since 1913. Her contract is for one year, though the door remains open beyond that.
“I’m excited and nervous, but the coaches are really nice, and it’s going to be a very fun experience,” she said.
For Hjort, watching one of his players head overseas to play college tennis is exactly what coaching is all about.
“We provide these kids with an opportunity and then they can go do what they will with it,” he said. “It’s awesome to see her taking it and using it as a tool to further her education and figure out what she wants to do.”
But Campbell hasn’t forgotten her roots.
She never fully put down her paddle during her two years on the tennis court. The Wood River Pickleball Club made sure she knew it hadn’t forgotten her either—awarding her a $2,500 scholarship to take with her across the Atlantic.
“I’m very grateful for that sense of community that I’ve gained from there,” she said.
Pickleball hasn’t quite made it to Italy yet. But there’s padel—a fast-growing racquet sport that combines tennis and squash on a smaller enclosed court. Campbell is already eager to give it a try.
“It seems really difficult, but I’m definitely going to try it,” she said.
Just like she tried tennis not that long ago. And look where that got her.
“I wasn’t expecting to do college tennis at all,” she said. “And yet, here I am.”