Shortly after her three-year playing career was cut short because of knee problems, Mary Carillo found work covering women’s tennis.

It came naturally to her. She knew the game inside and out, she knew the players, she was a natural storyteller and she could talk with the best of them. But there wasn’t a plethora of assignments to be had at that time, certainly not enough to build a career. It was 1980, and a woman calling men’s tennis was pretty much unheard of.

So the 1977 French Open mixed doubles champion did some teaching — she worked for the legendary Harry Hopman — did some writing and picked up the occasional broadcasting gig where she could. 

“It wasn’t a career,” the 68-year-old said, reflecting on the start of what would become an iconic sportscasting career. “It was a little side hustle.”

Carillo never expected that she would get the opportunity to cover men’s tennis, too. And 16 Olympics. And 27 years on the critically acclaimed news magazine Real Sports with Bryant Gumbel.

And she certainly never could have imagined, in her wildest dreams, that it would land her in the International Tennis Hall of Fame. But six Emmys, three Peabody Awards and 45 groundbreaking years later, that’s exactly where she’s heading after being elected to the Hall this month.

Carillo will be inducted in Newport the weekend of Aug. 27-29, 2026, and she’ll be enshrined alongside Roger Federer.

The honor, which she learned of on a Zoom call with — among others — childhood friend and former mixed doubles partner John McEnroe, fulfilled a dream that she never thought was remotely possible.

“This is the sport I love,” she said. “This is the thing that has changed my life. I just never imagined that I could get into the International Tennis Hall of Fame, which is reserved for the most special people — not just the players, but people like Bud Collins and Steve Flink, who I have genuinely, openly admired for decades.

“To be part of that community means the world to me. I just never saw this coming. Almost every one of my best friends comes out of this sport, and the people I admire most are in the Hall of Fame. I’m used to telling their stories and admiring them. I never thought I’d be among them.”

Carillo’s love for tennis is deeply rooted in her hometown of Queens, New York. She grew up in Douglas Manor, on Little Neck Bay, not far from McEnroe. She’d spend her days playing at the Douglaston Club, and she knew from a very young age that McEnroe was destined to become a true star. 

She didn’t feel the same way about herself. She knew she had talent, but whereas McEnroe dreamed of winning Wimbledon one day, Carillo just wanted to get there. 

“I just wanted to walk through the gates,” she said. “I didn’t have big aspirations. I didn’t have those dreams. My knees were terrible. I knew I only had a short time to play. I just wanted to make the most of it.”

Mary Carillo interviews her longtime friend and former doubles partner John McEnroe at the 2019 Laver Cup

Photo by Clive Brunskill/Getty Images for Laver Cup

She did make the most of it, playing Wimbledon three times — reaching the third round in 1979 — and reaching a career high of No. 33 in January 1980 before retiring shortly thereafter.

Having such a promising career cut short by injuries would devastate most athletes, but Carillo, knowing full well from the start that her playing days would be short-lived, transitioned naturally into the next phase of her life. 

Getting on the mic, telling stories, taking fans behind the scenes and discovering the heart of athletes from all over the world and all walks of life — that came naturally to her. And despite having no experience as a broadcaster, she was confident from day one. 

“I was much more nervous playing tennis than talking about it,” said Carillo, who splits her time between Naples, Florida and Manhattan’s West Village. “I understood the game, and I certainly understood the players. I felt comfortable pretty much from the start.

“For no good reason, I felt comfortable. I had no business being comfortable.”

Speaking expertly was one thing, but the mechanics of broadcasting was another. Stand-ups, how to interview effectively, getting sound bites vs. having a free-flowing conversation: all that had to be learned and homed. Carillo leaned in and mastered her craft, applying it to everything from analysis to deeply reported feature segments to long-form documentaries. (One of her three Peabody Awards was for her work on the HBO documentary Billie Jean King: Portrait of a Pioneer.)

Carillo also had to become an expert in other sports, some of which couldn’t be further from the grass and clay of the tennis court. Take luge and bobsledding, which she’s covered extensively as part of her work broadcasting the Winter Olympics. But the variety has kept it interesting and fresh, and provided an opportunity for Carillo to tell fascinating stories about athletes who don’t normally get top billing.

“You really get to admire the athletic heart, which is my favorite thing to do,” Carillo said.

Billie Jean King salutes Mary Carillo on her Hall of Fame induction

What’s next: The National Dog Show, the Olympics and lots of children’s books

Carillo recently covered the 2025 National Dog Show, which will air on NBC at 12 pm ET on Thanksgiving. (“I love that show,” she says. “I just like making people smile at something like that.”) And she’ll be in Italy in February covering the 2026 Winter Olympics.

Beyond that, she just wants to continue doing what she loves: telling stories. 

“Look, I’m crowding 70 now,” Carillo said. “If you’re a woman of a certain age, everyone wants newer and younger. I understand this business and I’m highly pragmatic. But I love doing it. I want to keep telling stories, whether it’s documentaries or long form or something else. Wherever that takes me.”

But at this stage of her life, Carillo is also content — and excited — to spend a sizable amount of her time with family. Her mom is 95 and her dad is about to be 100, and her daughter is pregnant with her third child. There are four generations of Carillos in Naples — “maybe one or two generations too many,” she says with her signature quick wit — and there’s lots of quality time to be had.

“I’m going to be telling a lot of stories to small children,” she said.

She’ll undoubtedly tell some more incredible stories in Newport next summer, the culmination of a brilliant career that has added an incalculable amount of depth and substance to tennis, women’s sports and broadcasting. 

“It’s a major upset, OK?” she said of her election into the Hall. “It could be the biggest upset in the history of sports.”

Maybe to her, but not to anyone who’s been paying attention. 

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