by Bobby Knight | Dec 24, 2015 | Blog
No team has been more consistent over the years than UCLA with the Bruins the only team to make the NCAA Round of 16 every year since the tournament expanded to 64 teams in 1999. UCLA head coach Billy Martin enters his 23rd year at the helm with 1 National Title (2005) and 4 National Runner-Ups (96/99/04/13) in his previous 22 years.Martin only loses 1 player from last year’s Round of 16 team though that 1 guy was a valuable one with Dennis Mkrtchian going 15-5 in dual-match play with the majority of his matches coming at #2 singles.UCLA returns everyone else with Mackenzie McDonald and Martin Redlicki expected to anchor the singles and doubles lineup....
by Bobby Knight | Dec 24, 2015 | Blog
During USC’s stretch of dominance, which saw them win 4 National Titles in 5 years, one of the biggest things that contributed to USC’s success (aside from Steve Johnson) was the lack of turnover among its starters. The last time USC had to replace more than 2 starters was all the back in 2008 (Van’t Hof, Sacks, Piotrowski) but this season they have to replace 4 with Yannick Hanfmann, Roberto Quiroz, Eric Johnson, and Jonny Wang all moving on after 4 spectacular seasons.Hanfmann, Quiroz, Johnson, and Wang accounted for 59% of USC’s dual-match singles wins last season though the 2 returning starters, Max de Vroome (Sr) and Nick Crystal...
by Bobby Knight | Dec 23, 2015 | Blog
Many wouldn’t consider a 27-9 season a disappointment but it is if you are accustomed to winning conference championships and making deep runs at the NCAAs. When Ohio State lost 4-3 to Texas A&M in the Round of 16 it marked the first time since 2005 that the Buckeyes hadn’t at least made the NCAA Quarterfinals. Ohio State had won the Big Ten conference tournament 8 of the previous 9 seasons but Illinois shut them out twice in Champaign last season with the second occurrence coming in the Big Ten finals.Ohio State’s strength last season was the bottom of the lineup with the 4 through 6 spots going 69-16 (.81) while the top half of...
by Bobby Knight | Dec 10, 2015 | Blog
TCU has plenty of history when it comes to men’s tennis but prior to last year most of it was distant history. TCU had made just 3 trips to the NCAA Round of 16 in the previous 16 years, with the most recent being in 2004, and hadn’t made the Round of 16 as a seed since 2000. TCU head coach David Roditi updated the record books last year when he guided his senior laden team to the NCAA semifinals and had them a whisker away from a spot in the finals.I thought this would be a rebuilding year after losing 5 seniors (Nick Chappell, Facundo Lugones, Arnau Dachs, Will Stein, Blake Wiggins) that accounted for 55% of TCU’s dual-match wins but...
by Bobby Knight | Dec 4, 2015 | Blog
The defending national champions will be shooting for their third title in the last four years and even though they lost one of the all-time greats in Mitchell Frank they’ll still have a pretty stacked roster that’s loaded with talent and experience. Virginia has a rugged top 3 with Ryan Shane, Collin Altamirano, and Thai-Son Kwiatkowski each likely to split time in the top 3 spots while there will be 5 guys (Ritschard, Aragone, Wiersholm, Styslinger, Corinteli) that are more than capable of filling the bottom 3 spots.Brian Boland has lined up a tough non-conference schedule that has the Hoos facing Kentucky and UCLA at home and Illinois, Tulsa,...
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