Patricia Hy was born in Phnom Penh and moved to Hong Kong in 1971 when she was 6. When she first arrived, she never played a sport of any kind, let alone tennis. By age 11, she was among a group of youngsters, which included the likes of Kelvin Inge and Mark Bailey, that was selected to the Junior Squad. By 1977, she rose to the junior No. 1 position after claiming the first of her four consecutive local under-18 girls’ singles titles. Then, in 1978, at age 13, her dominance extended to the women’s game when she captured the ladies’ singles and doubles at all three local majors – Hong Kong National Tennis Championships, SCAA Open, and CRC Open – to complete the Triple Crown for both singles and doubles. At age 14, she won the 1979 ITF Hong Kong Open Junior Championships.
She made history in 1983 when she finished runner-up in girls’ singles and won the girls’ doubles title at Wimbledon and reached a career-high No. 7 in the junior world rankings. That year, she captured her maiden pro circuit title and made the third round of the US Open women’s singles. At age 18, she held a Year-End WTA singles ranking of No. 68.
She was the first female student-athlete from Hong Kong to earn a full tennis scholarship to compete in NCAA Division I (at UCLA) and the first to earn All-America honours in women’s singles. In 1984, she became Hong Kong’s only Olympian in tennis, when she reached round two in women’s singles in Los Angeles. In 1986, at age 21, she lifted the Taipei Women’s Championships to become the only player from Hong Kong to capture a WTA singles title. She is the first player from Hong Kong to capture a WTA doubles title when she lifted the Auckland Open in 1994. She also reached the women’s doubles semifinal at the 1987 Australian Open when it was played on grass at Kooyong for the last time.
From 1981-87, she played a total of 14 Fed Cup ties for Hong Kong. She is best remembered for her three-set battle against then world No. 2 Steffi Graf in the World Group in 1987 when Germany went on to be crowned champions. That year, she led Hong Kong to victories against Finland, Belgium, Brazil and Sweden before losing to the Netherlands in the World Group consolation final.
She held a career-high WTA ranking of No. 28 in singles and No. 36 in doubles. From 1991, she was able to maintain a year-end WTA top 75 ranking in singles for the next seven straight seasons, and finished in the top 30 in 1992 and 1993, before she retired in 1998.
Local Majors
Ladies’ Singles
CRC Open
1978 1979
SCAA Open
1978 1979
Hong Kong National Tennis Championships
1978
Ladies’ Doubles
CRC Open
1978 1979
SCAA Open
1978 1979
Hong Kong National Tennis Championships
1978
Mixed Doubles
CRC Open
1978