Mohibullah Khan

(1938-1994)

One of a fearsome foursome -Hashim, Azam and Roshan -that rode the first wave of Khans coming to America, Mo Khan was a ferocious, acrobatic force on the court and a gregarious professional at the Harvard Club in Boston. Khan won, after seven tries, his only British Open in 1962; in the finals he engineered what many consider the greatest comeback in British Open history, when he was down 2-1, 8-1 in the fourth against the Egyptian Abou Taleb, saved three match balls and won 9-6 in the fifth game. In 1963 Khan followed his uncle Hashim and emigrated to the U.S. He went on to win four North American Opens and reach the finals four other times (the tournament was called the U.S. Open until 1965 when it was amalgamated with the Canadian Open). He also took five U.S. Pro titles, four professional veterans from 1979-1982 and a professional seniors in 1988. The lefthanded Khan played with a tempestuous gusto and blinding speed, “like a very angry octopus, ” wrote Rex Bellamy in Squash: A History. On the left wall on the doubles court, Khan was equally brilliant. He took five Johnson Opens in a row, 1970-1974, with Colin Adair, Ken Binns and cousin Gul Khan, and he won three Cambridge Doubles, in 1974 with Gul Khan and 1978-79 with Clive Caldwell. For thirty years Khan oversaw the fourteen singles and one doubles court at the Harvard Club, where he died outside the doubles court in 1994. “Mo could entertain either way, ” said Senator Ted Kennedy at his memorial service, “with his racquet or his conversation.” It was often said Mo Khan played every point as if it was the last one on earth.

North American Open Champion 1964, 1965, 1966, 1968
U.S. Professional Champion 1965, 1966, 1967, 1968, 1969