Jeff Kefalos From Friday, July 11, until Wednesday, July 16, the Columbia Tennis Center on Wheeler Hill was hopping with 450 junior tennis players from across South Carolina. The visitor count was far higher with the kids' parents, friends, and fans. Since it was a double elimination schedule, where all competitors get a second chance, the tournament crowd stayed for most of the duration.

The occasion was the S.C. Hardcourt Junior Championships, one of three statewide, state- residents- only summer junior tennis tournaments. The other two are the S.C. Clay Court Championships at the Greenville Country Club and the Palmetto Qualifying Tournament in Belton, a former textile town near Anderson and the home of the S.C. Tennis Hall of Fame Museum.

The Columbia junior tournament is managed every year by tennis professional Jeff Kefalos, who is the director of the Columbia Tennis Center and an assistant coach for the USC men's team. From 1977 until 1983, Kefalos was the USC women's tennis team coach, where he compiled a 127- 34 record.

Kefalos was born in Parkersburg, W. Va. His father was a chemist for Union Carbide. His mother managed the household, where he had an older brother and a younger sister.

He played tournament tennis all through high school. He traveled by himself in the summers to tournaments in California, Texas, Ohio, and wherever else he could qualify to play and manage the travel arrangements. A three- time West Virginia high school singles champion, Kefalos also won the 1972 state men's singles title, which was the summer before he entered college.

Kefalos accepted the scholarship offer from USC, and he began varsity play on the tennis team as player #3. In his junior and senior years, Kefalos alternated regularly between the #2 and #1 player slots. For all four years, including 1973 when Clemson was #1 in the ACC, his USC team beat Clemson. Also for each of those four years, Kefalos was selected as the team MVP.

Almost immediately after receiving his degree in business administration, Kefalos took the job of director of the Columbia Tennis Center when it opened in 1977.

His girlfriend Elizabeth Lindblom of Short Hills, N.J., met him in college, and she also graduated from USC. They married in Columbia's Trinity Cathedral. They have two children. Son Lance is a Georgia Tech graduate in construction in Atlanta, and daughter Rawlins is a rising junior at Appalachian State University in Boone, N.C.

Wife Betsy works at Round Robin on Devine Street on a school schedule. She takes the summers off.

Kefalos's next tournament to manage is the S.C. Adult Hard Court Championships from Friday until Monday, Aug. 1- 4, also at the Columbia Tennis Center. Another double elimination affair, the adult version is more social with more lunches and the like tied to the tournament schedule. Former top tennis player Dianne Light of nearby DiPrato's on Pickens Street caters some of the events as her donation. It's part of her proud diplomacy as a Columbian and her continuing support of the sport.

Upon unanticipated observations of the conditions of the cracked courts and the inadequate scale of the pro shop, both aging and minimally maintained, Kefalos offers no comment. He does, however, concur with the regulars' wish list that includes a bleacher/ stadium court for the crowds at tournament matches, particularly the finals, and a practice back board, an accommodation found at most any tennis complex in the world. The back board went the way of real estate when the practice facility was torn down to make way for a $1.1 million home, still for sale.

Having no practice back board is like a golf course with no practice putting green.

What Kefalos has in the Columbia Tennis Center is a destination. It's a tournament facility and headquarters for two major state championships in a city with more tennis players per capita, reportedly, than any metropolitan area in the country and more tennis players, total, of any city in the South outside Atlanta.