Joe Hunt (tennis)

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Hunt in 1943

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Hunt in 1943, not long before his death

Joseph "Joe" Raphael Hunt (February 17 1919–February 2 1945) was a champion American tennis player of the early 1940s from Southern California. He became a lieutenant in the U.S. Navy during World War II and, fifteen days short of his twenty-sixth birthday, was killed on a training mission off Daytona Beach, Florida, when his Grumman Hellcat crashed for still-unknown reasons.

In 1943 he won the United States singles championship at Forest Hills while lying on the ground. On match point Hunt collapsed with cramps while his opponent, Jack Kramer, hit a return that barely went long. Had it been in, most observers at the time felt that Kramer would have eventually won the match against Hunt. Hunt was unable to obtain leave from the Navy in 1944 in order to defend his title.

Hunt was inducted into the International Tennis Hall of Fame in Newport, Rhode Island in 1966.