The University of Texas at Austin Athletics
University of Texas
Florida (ITA National Team Indoors)
No. 11 Men’s Tennis Preview: ITA National Team Indoor Championships
02.15.2017 | Men's Tennis
Longhorns set for at least three matches this weekend at The University of Virginia.
WHAT: No. 11 Texas (9-1) takes on No. 6 Florida in the first round of the ITA National Team Indoor Championships. The Longhorns hold the No. 10 seed in the 16-team draw while Florida is seeded seventh.
WHEN/WHERE
No. 11 Texas vs. No. 6 Florida
Friday, Feb. 17 – Noon ET
Boar's Head Sports Club – Charlottesville, Virginia
LIVE SCORING:
Available later this week at the tournament home page: HERE
LIVE VIDEO (paid subscription required): HERE
TOURNAMENT DRAW: HERE
Texas and Florida earned entries into the four-day event by winning two matches each at their ITA Kick-Off Weekend home tournament sites. The two teams last met on Jan. 23, 2016 in Austin, where Florida prevailed by a 4-0 count at the ITA Kick-Off Weekend event.
The Texas-Florida winner will take on either second-seeded Wake Forest or 15th-seeded Mississippi State in the quarterfinals on Saturday (time TBD). The losing team will move to the consolation bracket.
PRE-TOURNAMENT COMMENTS
Texas head coach Michael Center
We've been to the National Indoors many times. It's exciting to go there, knowing all of the best teams will be in one spot. The guys are looking forward to it. We'll have a good opportunity to see where we're at. We don't want to get too high or too low in February, but I know the guys are excited to see how they can fare against some of the best teams in the country this week.
On Florida
We haven't played them very often through the years, but we know Florida is a very good team. They've got some older guys, and they have a really good player at the top of their lineup. Florida has beaten USC and UCLA, so we know this will be a really tough test. We know we'll have to play well if we want to win matches this weekend in Charlottesville.
ITA RANKINGS UPDATE (Feb. 8, Texas players)
Singles
5. Christian Sigsgaard
45. Yuya Ito
58. Harrison Scott
Doubles
27. Ito/Scott
HORNS BRING SIX-MATCH WINNING STREAK TO NATIONAL INDOORS
Texas heads to Charlottesville with momentum on its side after winning its last six matches over a three-week span. After suffered a 4-3 defeat at Tulsa on Jan. 20, Texas wrapped its three-match road swing with a 5-2 win at Arkansas (Jan. 22).
Texas returned home the following weekend and knocked off Drake (4-1) and Oregon (4-2) at the ITA Kick-Off Weekend event indoors at UT's Weller Tennis Center. The Horns held off Virginia Tech (4-3) the following week before wrapping their five-match home stand last weekend with 4-0 wins over Purdue and Texas A&M-Corpus Christi in a day-night doubleheader.
EIGHT STRAIGHT FOR SCOTT
Sophomore Harrison Scott is off to an excellent start through the opening month of dual-match play for the Longhorns. The Canadian has won all eight
of his singles decisions in the Horns' 10 dual matches this season.
In fact, Scott hasn't dropped a set since last October when he fell to TCU's 55th-ranked Guillermo Nunez at the ITA Texas Regional Championships.
Last weekend, Scott posted his second win of the season over a ranked opponent, as he knocked off Purdue's 111th-ranked Benjamin Ugarte in straight sets.
SIGSGAARD NAMED BIG 12 PLAYER OF THE WEEK
The Big 12 Conference announced Jan. 24 the selection of Texas freshman Christian Sigsgaard as the league's Men's Tennis Player of the Week. It marked the first such honor for UT's newcomer from Denmark.
On Jan. 15, Sigsgaard defeated Arkansas' Mike Redlicki, who won the 2016 USTA/ITA National Indoor Intercollegiate Championships in November and is currently ranked No. 6 in the ITA singles rankings. It marked Sigsgaard's third win over an ITA top-15 opponent this season.
Sigsgaard boasts an impressive 21-5 overall singles record after competing in the first two national championship events of the season – the ITA All-American Championships and the ITA National Indoor Intercollegiate Championships.
PRE-SEASON NOTES
LONGHORNS FEATURED PROMINENTLY IN I.T.A. PRESEASON RANKINGS
Texas earned a top-five team ranking, three top-50 singles placings and two top-50 doubles ranks in the Intercollegiate Tennis Association (ITA) preseason men's tennis rankings.
The Longhorns came in at No. 4 in the preseason national team poll, which marked the highest preseason ranking for Texas since 2009, when UT ranked second.
Texas returns all but one letterwinner from the 2016 squad that reached the NCAA Championships' round of 16 and came within a third-set tiebreaker from advancing to the NCAA quarterfinals.
At No. 6 nationally in singles, Danish freshman Christian Sigsgaard gave Texas its highest singles ranking since 2015, when his fellow countryman Soren Hess-Olesen ranked sixth in the final singles rankings.
Freshman Yuya Ito joined his classmate Sigsgaard in the top-40 of the ITA singles rankings at No. 36, and sophomore Harrison Scott came in at No. 47. Ito joined Scott to rank 38th nationally in doubles, while sophomores Rodrigo Banzer and Leonardo Telles held the No. 44 slot.
Sigsgaard posted an impressive 16-3 fall singles record and played in both fall national championship events – the ITA All-American Championships and the USTA/ITA National Indoor Intercollegiate Championships.
Sigsgaard won his first 14 matches, including 11 singles contests at the All-American, where he advanced all the way from the pre-qualifying and qualifying draws to the semifinals of the main draw. Sigsgaard won both of his matches two weeks ago against UTSA and Abilene Christian before adding another win on Jan. 15 against SMU's Ronald Slobodchikiv.
Ito notched a 12-6 singles record and joined Sigsgaard in the main draws of the All-American and the National Indoors.
Scott closed the fall with a 10-3 singles mark and won the main singles draw at the Cajun Tennis Classic. He teamed with Ito to register a 5-2 fall record in doubles. Banzer and Telles added a 3-1 doubles mark in fall tournament play.
MORE ON THE LONGHORNS
UT returns senior George Goldhoff, who ended his junior year with a No. 40 national ranking after defeating Texas A&M's Arthur Rinderknech and Ohio State's then-No. 1 Mikael Torpegaard in the Longhorns' final two matches of the season.
Sophomore Rodrigo Banzer won seven dual-matches last season in his first semester of collegiate tennis while junior Adrian Ortiz posted a 14-7 mark in dual matches. Sophomore Julian Zlobinsky notched 13 dual-match wins last season as a redshirt freshman.
UT also saw dual-match contributions last season from sophomores Johnny Goodwin and Colin Markes and juniors William Jou and John Mee.
A LOOK AHEAD
Texas hosts Wichita State at Weller Indoor Tennis Center on Friday, Feb. 24 (4:30 p.m.)
Players Mentioned
