Saturday Recap: Lamar Upsets Rice, ODU Over W&M, Drake Beats Wichita State, Ivies, GGC Outduels HPU, & More

There were two bigger stories on Saturday - the rain that wiped out several matches and Lamar upsetting No. 28 Rice 4-1. The bad weather out in California washed out the Oregon/Cal and San Diego/Santa Clara matches while UNC Wilmington and VCU were rained out in Richmond. Both of the matches in California are set to be played on Sunday while UNC Wilmington and VCU won't make their match up.

Earlier this season Lamar upset then No. 47 Iowa 4-2 but today's win over Rice took it to a new level. Lamar took the doubles point by winning the deciding match at No. 2 in a tiebreak and then the Cardinals took four opening sets in singles. Lamar junior Nikita Lis rolled over Tommy Bennett 6-2, 6-1 at No. 2 but Rice senior Adam Gustafsson countered with a 6-1, 6-4 win over Sebastian Santibanez at No. 3.

Wake Forest Rally Stuns #1 UNC, Miss State Upsets Arky, Tulsa Wins At Tulane, Columbia Outlasts Harvard, & more

The weekend definitely went out with a bang with several 4-3 thrillers including Wake Forest's 4-3 upset win over top-ranked North Carolina.

North Carolina won the doubles point for the 12th time in its last 13 matches with a 6-4 win at No. 1 and a 6-3 win at No. 2. The Tar Heels rode the momentum from the doubles point and took five opening sets in singles.

Wake Forest freshman Dennis Uspensky earned the only first set for the Demon Deacons and he was also the first to finish with a 6-0, 6-3 rout over UNC freshman Anu Kodali. It was Uspensky's 10th win in his last 11 matches.

Saturday Recap: SoCal Too Tough For NorCal, SMU Stuns South Florida, Texas Tech Wins A Thriller at Baylor, Ivy Roundup

It was a nice weekend for the two Southern California Pac-12 schools as both UCLA and USC swept their Northern California neighbors, Cal and Stanford. Both Cal and Stanford went 2-0 in doubles on the weekend but neither could do enough damage in singles to make the early lead hold up.

Cal's Mads Engsted and JT Nishimura cruised to a 6-2 win at No. 3 doubles over Gage Brymer and Max Cressy but the Bruins appeared to be in control with 4-1* and *4-2  leads at No. 1 and No. 2. Cal would get the break back on both courts and Filip Bergevi and Florian Lakat would take the final five games at No. 1 to win it 6-4 and give the Bears the doubles point.

UCLA came back in singles and took opening sets at 1, 2, 3, 4, and 6. UCLA sophomore Martin Redlicki made quick work over the slumping Andre Goransson by winning 6-1, 6-3 at No. 2. Goransson went 13-2 in the fall with 7 ranked wins but he's just 5-8 in dual-match play with a 1-8 record against ranked opponents.

Sunday Recap: Owls Shred #9 Texas Tech, Hogs Tops Rebs, USC Survives Oregon, Dawgs Tame the Cats

Rice was looking to win the Rice Invitational for the ninth year in a row but to achieve that feat it'd have to find a way to beat a top 10 team for the first time in 10 years. Both Rice and Texas Tech beat William & Mary and Drake on Saturday so both were playing well coming into today's finale.

Texas Tech's Felipe Soares and Hugo Dojas won 6-4 at No. 1 doubles but Rice's Jake Hansen and Emanuel Llamas came back from *1-4 down to win 7-5 at No. 3.  Rice's Jamie Malik and Adam Gustafsson trailed 6-3 in the tiebreak at No. 3 but would fight off a total of five match points to win a marathon tiebreak 14-12 to give Rice the doubles point and early 1-0 lead.

Saturday Recap: Pac-12 Goes 2-0 In Indian Wells, Texas Tech Wins the HMVC, TCU Over Columbia, Utah State Makes History

It was a good day for the Pac-12 at the BNP Paribas Open Collegiate Tennis Challenge as both No. 14 Cal and No. 12 USC picked up wins over Big 12 opponents.

In the first match of the day it was the Battle of the Bears as Cal took on No. 21 Baylor. BU's Max Tchoutakian and Tommy Podvinski picked up a 6-2 win at No. 2 but Cal's Mads Engsted and J.T. Nishimura countered with a 6-3 win at No. 3. Cal's No. 1 team of Filip Bergevi and Florian Lakat served for the match up 5-3 but BU's Julian Lenz and Will Little broke and then Lenz held for 5-5. Cal held for 6-5 then Bergevi and Lakat broke the Little serve from 30-40 to win it 7-5.

Thursday Recap: Buckeyes Top The Bulls, Columbia Wins at SMU, & Action Gets Underway in San Diego

After a calm Wednesday the pace picked up on Thursday with Ohio State taking on South Florida while the Hilton San Diego Mission Valley Spring Classic got underway with four close matches at two different sites.

No. 4 Ohio State made its outdoors debut in Tampa and despite getting tested the Buckeyes still had enough in the tank to get past No. 16 South Florida 4-3.  Ohio State's Chris Diaz didn't play in doubles (reasons unknown) but the Buckeyes still managed to win at No. 1 and No. 2. Diaz's normal partner, Hugo Di Feo, and Matt Mendez led 5-3 at No. 3 when the point was clinched.

Sunday Recap: TCU Too Good For Illini, Arkansas Stuns Oklahoma, Wake Topples Texas Tech, ODU Beats NCST

One day you're on the top of the mountain and the next day your toppling down the hill. Illinois took the court today against #8 TCU just 16 hours removed from its big win over #2 Virginia so you had to figure they'd have a tough time replicating the same energy in such a short span.

It was sunny and 65 degrees outside at match time but the 25-30 mile per hour wind gusts kept play indoors. I knew the crowd wouldn't be as big as Saturday night but I was impressed with the Sunday afternoon turnout of just over 400.

SC Stomps Stanford, Michigan Tops Washington, Texas Tech Beats the Pack, & More

The featured match of the day took place in Palo Alto with Stanford hosting USC in a non conference matchup. Stanford had dropped the doubles point in three consecutive matches and it didn't get off to the best start after USC's Rob Bellamy and Jake DeVine picked up a quick 6-2 win at #3. However a short while later Stanford's Nolan Paige and David Wilczynski would win 6-3 at #2 and then Tom Fawcett and Maciek Romanowicz sealed the doubles point with a 6-4 win at #1.

USC quickly turned things around in singles by taking five opening sets and Nick Crystal needed just over an hour to finish off David Wilczynski 6-3, 6-1 at #2. Stanford would end up being just as dominant in the second set as USC was in the first because the Cardinal took four second sets while USC's Jack Jaede forced a split at #5.

Wake Rocks OU, Boilers Stun Tulsa, Rice Claws LSU, Nwstern Too Good For Duke, Dartmouth Out Greens The Wave

While the final day of the Pac-12/SEC Showdown in Los Angeles was a washout, it was warm and dry at the indoor facilities in Norman and Tulsa.

Wake Forest was coming off a tough loss on Friday to #25 Oklahoma State but the Demon Deacons made up for it today by taking out #2 Oklahoma. Wake played a solid doubles point as its #2 team of Petros Chrysochos and Jon Ho ran away with a quick 6-1 win at #2. Wake's #1 team of Christian Seraphim and Skander Mansouri broke the Axel Alvarez serve to go up 2-0 but Alvarez and Spencer Papa broke back to make it 2-1. It stayed on serve until Wake broke Spencer Papa's 5-6 service game on the deciding point to take the match 7-5 and give Wake the usually all-important doubles point. The match at #3 was on serve when Wake got the clincher at #1.

Oklahoma was playing without its #2 singles starter, Andrew Harris, since he's still recovering from knee tendonitis so everyone except Axel Alvarez had to shift up a spot in the lineup. OU had to do the same thing last week so it wasn't a surprise to any of the guys.

Friday Recap: Pokes Take Out The Deacs, Illini Dabs The Duke, Seminoles Roll The Tide, Tulane Wins Thriller

There was a solid schedule of matches on Friday and fortunately for us viewers almost all of them had a live stream available. There were a pair of top 25 teams going head to head and as expected both were close matches. #7 Illinois held on for a 4-3 road win at #24 Duke while #25 Oklahoma State pulled off the upset and beat #11 Wake Forest.

Oklahoma State took the doubles point with wins at #1 and #2 and then picked up first sets at #3, #5, and #6 while Wake took the rest. It looked like Dennis Uspensky was going to get the first set at #5 but Tristan Meraut broke him and then took the tiebreak 7-4.

The Madness Has BEGUN!!

The 1st round of the 2015 NCAA Tournament is in the books and while there were plenty of 4-0 blowouts (20) there were several nail-biters with 5 matches finishing with a 4-3 score and 2 of those 5 finishing in a 3rd set tiebreak.  The weather played a big role on Day 1 with several regionals experiencing delays and some having to move indoors.

Quick Summary:

• #1 seeds went 16-0 versus #4 seeds with 15 of 16 being a 4-0 final.  Va Tech/ETSU 4-1 was the exception.
• #2 seeds were 13-3 versus #3 seeds 
• Drake, Pepperdine, and San Diego State were the #3 seeds to crash the party. 
• 20 matches finished with a 4-0 final
• 4 matches finished with a 4-1 final
• 3 matches finished with a 4-2 final
• 5 matches finished with a 4-3 finals (2 were 7-6 in 3rd)  
• Teams winning the doubles point went 24-7
• San Diego State, Pepperdine, Stanford, Minnesota, Columbia, Northwestern, and Drake were the 7 teams to lose the doubles point but yet win the match.  
• Regionals delayed by weather: USC, UCLA, Baylor, Texas, Texas A&M, Illinois, Oklahoma

NCAA 1st Round Previews: Oklahoma & UCLA Regionals

NCAA Interactive Bracket & Printable Bracket - all times EST.

Oklahoma Regional

Headington Family Tennis Center - Norman, OK

[1] Oklahoma (24-2) vs. [49-64] New Mexico State (11-13) - Friday 5pm - Not a whole lot of analysis needed for this one with the #1 team in the country playing the WAC champs who come in with a losing record.  This will be Oklahoma's 27th match this year but only the 2nd against an unranked opponent - Purdue was the other.

Sunday Recap: Hoos Too Much For Hokies, Texas A&M Gets Past Florida

Both Virginia and Texas A&M faced tough opposition on Sunday but both answered the bell and came out on top.  Virginia won the doubles point and then took all 6 opening sets and managed to finish the top 3 out in straights as Mitchell Frank, Ryan Shane, and Thai-Son Kwiatkowski all won.   Virginia played singles without one of its top 3 players as Collin Altamirano sat out due to a stomach bug.

Virginia Tech did show some fight down low but Virginia still managed to win 2 of those 3 with all going 3 sets.

Virginia recap

"I was pleased with the overall performance today," said head coach Brian Boland. "Virginia Tech showed why they are a top-15 team, if not better. They are solid from top to bottom. We had all the momentum, winning doubles and six first sets, but they never gave up. We had to overcome a little adversity today and I was happy with how we responded to that."

"Missing Collin and Alex (Ritschard) in singles, I was pleased with how the guys stepped up," said Boland. "Alex is continuing to get better and is getting close to being back. Collin had a stomach bug and was able to play doubles, but not singles today. I thought the team responded well to having to reshuffle the lineup a little bit."

Bears Sic 'Em, Oklahoma Rallies Past Columbia, Toreros Hold Off Drake, Vandy Survives

Saturday had several close ones with both Baylor and Oklahoma pulling through in the BNP Paribas Collegiate Challenge while San Diego and Princeton both won tight ones in the Hilton San Diego Mission Valley Spring Classic.   There was also a good one in Nashville where Vanderbilt won a 3rd set tiebreak in the deciding match to avoid getting upset by unranked Kentucky.

The headliner of the day was between #3 Baylor and #4 USC.  It was almost a forgone conclusion that Baylor would take the doubles point with how dominant they'd been in doubles play but USC had the point well within grasp.  Baylor's #3 duo of Vince Schneider and Felipe Rios were first off the court with 6-3 win but USC's #1 pair of Yannick Hanfmann and Roberto Quiroz answered with a 6-4 win.  So it all came down to #2 doubles where Baylor's Julian Lenz and Diego Galeano had jumped out to an early break lead on USC's Max De Vroome and Eric Johnson.  USC's 2s would break back to even it at 4 then get a De Vroome hold to go up 5-4 and then would go up 0-30 on the Galeano serve.  The Baylor 2s would win 4 straight points to hold for 5-5 but then Eric Johnson would hold at 40-15 to put USC up 6-5.  For the second service game in a row Baylor would go down 0-30 but they'd dig themselves out again by winning 3 straight points to go up 40-30.  After USC got the next point to make it 40-40, which was a deciding/break point, Lenz dropped the hammer on a 1st serve and sent to a tiebreak.  The tiebreak was all Baylor as they jumped out to a 4-0 lead and ended up cruising to a 7-1 win.

Friday Recap: Wake Too Good for VT, USC Gets Its Revenge, The Ville Rocks UNC, Several 4-3 Nailbiters

Friday brought us several close ones as 6 matches finished with a 4-3 final score though of course there were several that weren't as close most notably 3 of the 4 in Indian Wells.  

The big upset of the day came in Louisville as the #29 Cardinals stunned #10 North Carolina 5-2.  It looked like #7 Texas A&M might get picked off too however the Aggies rallied late and held off #35 Mississippi State 4-1.  #33 Drake came back from 3-0 down to stun #22 Harvard 4-3 and #23 LSU pulled out a tight 4-3 win on the road at #60 Alabama.

In the biggest match of the day #12 Wake Forest ran its winning streak to 4 with a 5-2 win over #16 Virginia Tech.  The Demon Deacons cruised past Va Tech in doubles and then Noah Rubin made it 2-0 with a 6-1, 6-1 beat down of Amerigo Contini at #1 singles.  Jon Ho would extend the lead to 3-0 with a 6-4, 6-3 win at #4 singles over Hunter Koontz before Virginia Tech's Edoardo Tessaro would put the Hokies on the board with a come from behind 4-6, 6-2, 6-2 win over Christian Seraphim at #5 singles. Romain Bogaerts would clinch the win for Wake Forest with a 6-4, 3-6, 6-3 win at #2 singles over Andreas Bjerrehus and then the teams would split the 2 remaining matches after the clinch.  

Wake Forest now sets its sights on #6 Duke with Wake making the short trip to Durham on Sunday.

Thursday Recap: Vandy Owns The Volunteer State + Full Day of Action in San Diego

Vanderbilt ran its record to 4-0 against teams from the state of Tennessee with an impressive 4-1 win over #40 Tennessee.  The Vols took the doubles point but Vandy took 5 opening sets and ended up getting wins from Gonzales Austin, Danny Valent, Baker Newman, and Suresh Eswaran.

FYI, the number beside the player's school is the player's Universal Tennis Rating as of March 19th.  For more details about UTR check out their website. 

#17 Vanderbilt 4, #40 Tennessee 1

Singles

1. #10 Gonzales Austin (VU 14.40) def. #14 Mikelis Libietis (UT 14.23) 6-4, 6-2

2. Hunter Reese (UT 13.28) vs. Rhys Johnson (VU 13.45) 5-7, 6-1, 2-3 unf.

3. Danny Valent (VU 13.75) def. Jack Schipanski (UT 13.13) 6-2, 6-0

4. Luis Valero (UT 13.24) vs. Kris Yee (VU 13.58) 7-6 (6), 4-6, 2-0

5. Baker Newman  (VU 12.87) def. Igor Smelyanski (UT 13.43) 6-4, 3-6, 6-4

6. Suresh Eswaran (VU 12.89) def. Brandon Fickey (UT 12.10) 6-1, 6-3

Doubles

1. #2 Reese/Libietis, UT, def. #1 Austin/Johnson, VU, 6-2

2. Dromsky/Smelyanski, UT, def. Newman/Binet, VU, 7-5

3. Schipanski/Valero, UT, vs. Eswaran/Smith, VU, 6-6 unf.

Order of Finish: Doubles (1,2); Singles (6,2,1,5).

Baylor breezes past UCLA, Oklahoma too much for North Carolina, Ivy League's run ends

It was a rainy Sunday across much of the country and while several matches were cancelled due to a lack of indoor courts those that had them put them to use. The matches that were cancelled were Tulsa at Texas A&M, Tennessee vs. Georgia Southern (@ Troy, AL), and a pair of consolation matches at the Blue Gray Classic in Montgomery, Alabama - Boise State vs. Alabama and Auburn vs. Mississippi State.

Baylor's home match with UCLA was moved indoors and in the blink of an eye it was over with the Bears rocking UCLA 4-0 in less than 2 hours.  Baylor improved to 10-0 on the year in doubles with a pair of easy wins at 2 and 3 and were also serving for the match at 1 when the clinch occurred. Baylor took 1st sets at 1, 4, 5, and 6 and Vince Schneider, Felipe Rios, and Julian Lenz each closed out their respective matches in straight sets to seal the win.  Baylor's Mate Zsiga was 2 points away from winning on 5 while UCLA's Dennis Mkrtchian had a set lead on 2 and Martin Redlicki was up 2-1 in the 3rd on 3.

Sunday Preview

Rain is in the forecast in many parts of the country so matches are being cancelled or being moved indoors.  Here is my preview of the bigger matches on Sunday (Texas A&M/Tulsa already cancelled due to rain).

#23 Vanderbilt (8-2) at #25 Harvard (8-2)- 12pm est - Harvard Twitter & Video - Both teams have beaten Minnesota over the last 2 days with Vandy squeaking out a 4-3 win on Friday while Harvard throttled the Gophers pretty good on Saturday by a 5-2.  Vandy is 7-2 in doubles while Harvard is 8-2 so it should be a pretty exciting start to the the match.  I could see Harvard winning the match despite dropping the doubles point but I don't see Vanderbilt finding 4 points without the doubles point.  Vandy has now played in 6 matches that have finished 4-3 while Harvard has played in 5 that were either 4-2 or 4-3 so both teams are used to the pressure.  I like Vandy in doubles and Austin and Valent in singles but I like Beltrame, Hu, Tao, and Yeung for the Crimson.  Prediction: Harvard 4-3

Projected Lineup
1. #8 Gonzales Austin (VU 14.40) vs. #91 Denis Nguyen (HV 13.99)
2. Rhys Johnson (VU 13.34) vs. #80 Sebastian Beltrame (HV 13.21)
3. Kris Yee (VU 13.73) vs. Nicky Hu (HV 13.78)
4. Danny Valent (VU 13.74) vs. Alex Steinroeder (HV 13.37)
5. Baker Newman (VU 13.00) vs. Kenny Tao (HV 13.11)
6. Suresh Eswaran (VU 12.87) vs. Brian Yeung (HV 13.19)

Stanford wins the Big Slam, Ohio State makes it 200 straight, Wake toogood, Ivy League no joke + My Sunday Preview

I knew it'd be hard for today's matches to follow up those from Friday but while a few of them came up short in the drama department the one that didn't was the "Big Slam" in Berkeley as Stanford pulled out a classic 4-3 win over rival Cal.  

Cal jumped out to the early lead by taking the doubles point with a 7-5 win at #3 doubles in the clinching match.  Stanford welcomed freshman David Hsu back into the singles lineup at 5 which shifted Nolan Paige to 6 while Cal made a switch at 5 and 6 and moved Greg Bayane up from 6 to 5 and dropped Wikberg from 5 to 6.  After dropping the doubles point the momentum shifted back to Stanford in singles as the Cardinal took 4 opening sets and managed to finish 3 of them off in straights as Tom Fawcett, John Morrissey, and "Rollin" Nolan Paige won at 1, 3, 6 to give Stanford a 3-1 lead.  Cal would answer back with wins from Filip Bergevi and Greg Bayane at 2 and 5 to tie it up at 3.  

All focus was centered on #4 singles where Cal freshman J.T. Nishimura had opened up a 5-2 lead in the 3rd set over Stanford junior Maciek Romanowicz and Nishimura was serving for the match. Nishimura fell behind 15-40 in his service game and after getting it back to the deciding point (40-40), which was also a match point, he would put a shot into the net to give Romanowicz the break. Romanowicz went up 40-15 on his 3-5 service game but then Nishimura hit a two-handed forehand winner to make it 40-30 and followed that up with a backhand winner past a drawn in Romanowicz to bring up the deciding point (40-40).  Nishimura chose the ad-court to receive the serve on what would be his final match point and Romanowicz landed his 1st serve out wide and as the outstretched arm of Nishimura deflected it back in play Romanowicz closed in toward the net and hit a volley into the open court for the hold.  Nishimura would now serve for the match for a 2nd time up 5-4 and he would quickly get broke at love as Romanowicz continued to play aggressively while Nishimura tightened up and had difficulty keeping the ball in play.  Romanowicz would then hold at 40-15 to go up 6-5 and would then race out to an 0-40 lead on the Nishimura serve. After a Romanowicz error made it 15-40 Nishimura wouldn't be able to keep the next one in play and with that Stanford had stunned its rival 4-3.

Saturday Preview

Friday was an entertaining start to the weekend and I expect that Saturday should more of the same.  Let's take a look at the highlighted matches on Saturday.

The number beside the player's school is the player's Universal Tennis Rating as of the current date so Notre Dame's Quentin Monaghan has a 14.28 UTR as of today 2/21.  For more details about UTR check out theirwebsite.  

#17 Notre Dame (6-1) at #9 Ohio State (10-3) - 12pm est - Live Scoring & Streaming - Ohio State goes for #200 in a row at home (according to my records) though it won't be easy as Notre Dame usually gives Ohio State a tough match just about every year.  Ohio State has won 10 straight in the series and leads the all-time series 28-27.  A year ago in South Bend, Notre Dame jumped out to a 2-0 lead only to see Ohio State win 4 straight singles matches with the final 2 both being 7-6 in the 3rd.  If the projected lineups below hold up there will be just 1 rematch from last year with that being the match at 1 where Diaz knocked off Monaghan 7-6, 6-4.  Ohio State is 11-2 in doubles while Notre Dame is 6-1.  The Irish must take the doubles point to have a realistic chance at stopping the streak but I think Ohio State gets the point and picks up wins from the bottom 3 of Steinbach, Callahan, and Metka to pull it out.  Prediction:  Ohio State 4-1

Projected Lineup:
1. #29 Quentin Mongahan (ND 14.28) vs. #53 Chris Diaz (OSU 13.80)
2. #92 Josh Hagar (ND 13.74) vs. #30 Mikael Torpegaard (OSU 13.95)
3. Eddy Covalschi (ND 13.13) vs. Herkko Pollanen (OSU 13.58)
4. Eric Schnurrenberger (ND 13.45) vs. #68 Ralf Steinbach (OSU 13.91)
5. Billy Pecor (ND 12.98) vs. #110 Hunter Callahan (OSU 13.90)
6. Nicolas Montoya (ND 12.48) vs. Kevin Metka (OSU 13.80)