by Bobby Knight | Feb 14, 2016 | Blog
It was definitely a day of thrillers as both Virginia and TCU each won 4-3 matches that came down to a close third set to decide the match.Virginia came into its match against ACC foe Wake Forest riding an incredible 139-match conference winning streak but the streak would come oh so close to ending.Wake Forest came out and claimed the doubles point by winning both #1 and #3 doubles in a tiebreak. Skander Mansouri and Christian Seraphim posted a 7-0 shutout in the tiebreak at #1 while Romain Bogaerts and Dennis Uspensky won the deciding tiebreak at #3 by taking it 7-3. Both Bogaerts and Uspensky really went after JC Aragone in the tiebreak as the Virginia...
by Bobby Knight | Feb 14, 2016 | Blog
We now know what one of the semifinals will be at the 2016 Men’s National Team Indoor Championships after #7 North Carolina overpowered #8 Ohio State 4-2 and #9 UCLA took control late to beat #2 Texas A&M 4-2. In the opening match of the day North Carolina jumped out to an early 1-0 lead by doing something that no other team had been able to do to Ohio State this season – take the doubles point. Ohio State came into the match with a perfect 9-0 record in doubles but North Carolina took the point fairly comfortably with a 6-2 win at #1 and a 6-4 win at #2.Ohio State’s #1 team of Ralf Steinbach and Martin Joyce broke serve to start...
by Bobby Knight | Feb 13, 2016 | Blog
[3] North Carolina (7-0) vs. [6] Ohio State (9-0) – 9am est – The opening quarterfinal of the day should be a dandy with Ohio State come off a 4-0 rout of Baylor while North Carolina overcame Texas Tech 4-1. North Carolina may be the higher ranked team but I think Ohio State is the team to beat on the bottom of the draw. Ohio State has been downright dominant in doubles over the years and this year is no different with the Buckeyes a perfect 9-0.Overall Record: North Carolina 7-0, Ohio State 9-0Indoors Record: North Carolina 7-0, Ohio State 9-0Doubles Record: North Carolina 5-2, Ohio State 9-0Projected Singles Lineup w UTR in ( ):1....
by Bobby Knight | Feb 13, 2016 | Blog
The second half of the day kicked off with USC playing South Florida on the stadium courts while TCU and Illinois duked it out on the back six.South Florida knew it needed the doubles point to give itself a chance to win and it took the point with a 6-0 rout at #3 and a 6-3 win at #2.Singles however was a different story as USC really jumped USF especially at the top of the lineup. USC’s Nick Crystal, Max de Vroome, Jake DeVine, Logan Smith, and Thibault Forget took first sets while USF’s only first set came from Peter Bertran at #5. Fortunately for South Florida, the Georgia transfer made quick work of USC’s Laruens Verboven by winning 6-2,...
by Bobby Knight | Feb 13, 2016 | Blog
The action is heating up in Charlottesville with half of the day’s Round of 16 matches already in the books. The first two matches of the day didn’t have a ton of suspense as #8 Ohio State ran over #4 Baylor 4-0 and #7 North Carolina overcame the loss of the doubles point to beat #14 Texas Tech 4-1.The second set of matches though were both thrillers with #3 Texas A&M holding off hard charging #14 Columbia 4-2 and #9 UCLA coming back from 3-2 down to beat #11 Georgia 4-3.UCLA head coach Billy Martin wasn’t exactly looking forward to another match with Georgia despite the Bruins success versus them two weeks ago, “I thought there...
by Bobby Knight | Feb 11, 2016 | Blog
Here are the current men’s & women’s top 25 along with all of their schedules from now until the end of the season. It’s much easier to view at the link below.Schedule Grid (click to view in separate window) {loadposition ads}
by Bobby Knight | Feb 11, 2016 | Blog
The draws are out and the lineups are set for the 2016 ITA Men’s National Team Indoor Championships with play getting started on Friday at the Boar’s Head Sports Club in Charlottesville, Virginia. Play gets started each day at 9am eastern and finishes each night around 9 to 10pm.I’m going to preview each round of 16 match using the master lineups that each team submitted and I’ll make my predictions as well. With this being an indoor event I’ll also take into account which teams are comfortable playing indoors while others only play indoors a handful of times each season.There will be live scoring on all 12 courts but only...
by Bobby Knight | Feb 10, 2016 | Blog
The post NTI women’s rankings are out and as expected Cal is the new #1 after winning its first-ever team national championship. The previous #1, Vanderbilt, fell 4 spots to #5 after suffering a quarterfinals loss to Ohio State with the Buckeyes themselves rising 10 spots from #16 to #6.The individual rankings for both the women and men were released as well with several guys and gals entering for the first time with many previously unranked due to not playing in the fall.Tulane’s Dominik Koepfer and Virginia’s Thai-Son Kwiatkowski stayed at #1 and #2 in the men’s singles rankings while Stanford’s Tom Fawcett rose from #9 to #3...
by Bobby Knight | Feb 10, 2016 | Blog
The draws have been released for this year’s Men’s National Team Indoors and while most of the teams were slotted where I expected there were a few surprises.I expected Ohio State and UCLA to pass USC based off each picking up top 20 wins last week but the committee kept USC in front despite its best win this year being against #22 Florida.I thought a two loss Baylor, with a best win over #42 Oregon, would fall behind a one loss Illinois with the Illini having wins over #21, #25, #36 (2X) and the one loss coming to #3 North Carolina – I’d love to hear the logic on keeping Baylor that high.I thought South Florida may drop one spot after...
by Bobby Knight | Feb 9, 2016 | Blog
There’s going to be a ton of good tennis this weekend in Charlottesville with Virginia hosting the National Team Indoors but I think the best matchup of the week might be tonight with Virginia hosting #9 UCLA. I have these teams as #1 and #2 in my rankings and I expect that this will be a very, very good match with plenty of courts going three sets.This will be Virginia’s first real test of the season while UCLA has been tested a few times but this will be the first time that the Bruins have played indoors. The doubles point will be more crucial for UCLA because it’s going to be hard enough to win three singles matches over Virginia let alone...
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