Men's Tennis Readies For Big 12 Championships
4/28/2010 12:00:00 AM | Men's Tennis
April 28, 2010
Baylor Men's Tennis Big 12 Championship Notes
Big 12 Championship Tournament Central
WACO, Texas - The seventh-ranked Baylor men's tennis team will kick off its run for the program's eighth Big 12 Championship title when the Bears face 40th-ranked and sixth-seeded Nebraska (13-11, 1-5). The match is scheduled for Fri., April 30, at 3 p.m. at the Penick-Allison Tennis Center on the campus of the University of Texas.
Baylor enters the 2010 Big 12 Championships as the No. 3 seed for the first time as the Bears go for their fourth consecutive championship title. For the first time since 1998, Baylor will not be the No. 1 or No. 2 seed in the championships after finishing the conference season 4-2. The third place finish in conference marked the end of Baylor's streak of eight consecutive Big 12 regular season titles.
On the season, the Bears are 20-5 overall, after finishing with a victory over No. 13 Texas Tech to extend their win streak to four matches. This season, the Bears are 1-2 in neutral site contests, but got past Nebraska earlier in the season, 4-3, in Waco to maintain their perfect 20-0 record against the Cornhuskers during the Matt Knoll era. The winner of the Baylor/Nebraska match will face the winner of the Texas A&M/Oklahoma State match at noon on Sat., May 1.
Live scoring for all Big 12 Championship matches can be found here.
CURRENT €ˆTEAM €ˆSTREAKS €ˆAND €ˆTRENDS: Overall, the Bears have won 35 of 41 matches dating back to last season, including 15 of their last 18. The Bears enter Friday's match looking to extend their four-match win streak. Prior to the current streak, the Bears had lost two straight for the first time since dropping matches earlier in the year against Florida and Louisville. The four-match win streak is only the third-longest for the Bears as they had an eight-match win streak earlier in the season and started their dual match campaign by winning five in a row.
DOUBLES POINT STREAKS AND TRENDS: Baylor has won the doubles point in its last four matches, after losing the previous three. The catalyst for the turnaround has been the team of Maros Horny and Sergio Ramirez, who have gone 4-0 at the No. 3 spot. The team of Jordan Rux and Attila Bucko are 3-0 at the two spot during the stretch, but the Bears' No. 1 duo of Denes Lukacs and Roberto Maytin are only 1-3 in the last four matches. Baylor is 17-0 in matches when winning the doubles point and just 3-5 when losing it.
SINGLES STREAKS AND TRENDS: Senior Dominik Mueller enters Friday's match with a five-match win streak. Behind the senior, Julian Bley has played well, taking four matches in a row, while at the top of the Bears' lineup Denes Lukacs has been solid lately winning four of his last five contests.
BAYLOR IN BIG 12 CHAMPIONSHIP PLAY: The Bears have produced phenomenal results in the Big 12 Championships. Currently, the Bears own more titles than the rest of the league combined. The Bears have been at the top of the championship podium the last three years and have produced a 27-6 record in championship play over the program's history. The Bears have had four players honored as the event's Most Outstanding Performer, while being seeded as the No. 1 team in the championships eight times. When the championships have been held in Austin, Baylor is 4-1 with a title in 2005. When the Bears are not seeded as the No. 1 or No. 2 team in the championships, they are 2-2.
SCOUTING NEBRASKA: The 40th-ranked Cornhuskers will play as the sixth-seed in the upcoming championships after finishing Big 12 Conference play with a 1-5 mark. The lone conference win was the school's first Big 12 conference victory since 2007, as the Huskers beat 49th-ranked Oklahoma State, 4-3, on April 3, at the Nebraska Tennis Center. However, after the win, Nebraska would lose its next four conference matches to finish its season with a 13-11 record. Nebraska is coached by 29th year head coach Kerry McDermott.
PLAYERS €ˆTO €ˆWATCH: The Cornhuskers have two singles players in the ITA rankings with Calin Paar at No. 70 and Christopher Aumueller at No. 80. In doubles rankings, Paar partners with David Bendheim to form the 35th-ranked duo in the country.
BAYLOR VS. NEBRASKA €ˆIN €ˆBIG 12 CHAMPIONSHIP €ˆPLAY: €ˆThe Bears have faced off against the Huskers six previous times over the course of the 13-year history of the Big 12 Tennis Championships. Baylor has swept every meeting 4-0 dating back to 1997 and continuing in 2003, 2004, 2005, 2006 and in 2008. This will also be the seventh time the schools will meet in Baylor's opening contest of the championships.
LOOKING AHEAD: After competing in the Big 12 Championships this weekend, Baylor will wait until Tue., May 4, to see where the NCAA €ˆselection committee will have the Bears play their first and second round of NCAA €ˆChampionship action. The selection show will be aired on ESPNews beginning at 4 p.m.
Quotes: Head coach Matt Knoll
On playing in the Big 12 Championship:
"We are excited to play. We feel like we are playing better than we have been. The great news is we have a lot of very good teams in our league that we get a chance to prove ourselves against. We are thinking about Nebraska. We have a lot of respect for them and we are going to try to go out and play a great match against them. We had a tough time with them here two weeks ago. Hopefully, we can play better. We think we have made some improvements and if we win that one, we will be excited about what comes next. We couldn't be more fired up. We couldn't be more excited and I think we are going to have a lot of fun."
On the senior leadership of the team:
"I know all of our seniors are excited about finishing on a high note. To have the kind of success you want to have seniors are important."
On never having been a three-seed before:
"I think everything is pretty much the same. We are not going to evaluate our season based on April. We are going to evaluate our season based on what happens in the postseason. If we can play a little better we have some confidence we can be pretty good down the stretch."
On the difference that shuffling the doubles lineup has made:
"It has made more of a difference than I would have thought. It has helped the confidence of the group, maybe more than it should. I think it is important for you to feel you have a chance to win the doubles. I think our guys feel that they have a chance to win doubles and maybe at times this year they did not have that feeling."
On the improvements of his team:
"I think we are definitely over the hump. We slumped a little bit at times and not as a group, but individually. You look at our individual records and see that there haven't been times when everybody was clicking at the same time. That has cost us a couple matches, but I feel everybody is feeling pretty good now and feeling pretty confident. Certainly, our doubles are on track and we feel we have a chance to win at every single position against every team in the country."
Players Mentioned
