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Saturday Preview: Conference Semifinal Saturday + Pac 12 Championship

It’s go time for the ACC, Big 10, and Big 12 with each conference down to the semifinals of their conference tournaments plus the Pac 12 has reached its Championship match.ACC:#5 [1] Virginia vs. #16 [4] North Carolina – 10am est – Virginia won both the regular season meetings with the Wahoos beating UNC 6-1 in Charlottesville and blanking them 4-0 at the National Indoors in Chicago.  Neither match was particularly close though the match at UVA was the better of the two with UNC taking 3 sets and losing several 7-5. FYI, the number beside the player’s school is the player’s Universal Tennis Rating as of April 25th  For...

Friday Recap: Gophers Shock Illini & SEC Tournament Follows Form

Just when you thought it was safe to go outside at night the Minnesota Golden Gophers jumped out from behind the tree and yelled boo and shocked #3 Illinois 4-3. Minnesota took the doubles point for the 20th time in 24 matches by getting wins at #1 (Jack Hamburg/Mathieu Froment) and #2 (Felix Corwin/Leandro Toledo) with the win at #2 coming in the tiebreak.  Illinois had won the doubles point in the previous 6 matches but is now just 15-10 on the year in doubles.Despite falling behind, many people including myself thought Illinois would turn it on in singles and still get it done but Minnesota said not tonight. The biggest singles upset came in the first...

Sunday Recap: Illinois, Virginia, Oklahoma, Texas A&M All Win Big

It was expected to be a dynamite day with 4 matches taking place between top 15 teams but in the end we got 4 lopsided matches with 3 of the 4 wrapped up in under 2 hours and 20 minutes.Illinois put an end to Ohio State’s 97 match regular season Big 10 winning streak with a 4-0 win.  The Illini surprised many by taking the doubles point with wins at 2 and 3 doubles.  Illinois’ #2 team of Aron Hiltzik and Ross Guignon got a break to start the match and never looked and rolled to an 8-5 win.  Below is match point which includes a swing and miss by Diaz. The Illinois’ #3 team of Farris Gosea and Aleks Vukic fell behind 3-1 before...

Sunday Preview: Ohio St/ILL, UVA/Duke, TX/OU, Ole Miss/aTm + Sunday Storylines

Sunday should be a fabulous day of tennis with 4 matches taking place between top 15 teams with Champaign, Charlottesville, College Station, and Norman the hot places to be.  3 of the 4 will take place outdoors with only the Ohio State/Illinois match likely headed indoors due to crummy weather.I see at least 1 lower ranked team winning but I definitely wouldn’t call it an upset. Check out the stats and projected lineups and see if you can figure out who wins each match.#11 Ohio State (16-6) at #3 Illinois (16-3) – 1pm est – This will be the 2nd meeting of the year between these two with Illinois taking the first one 4-2 in the...

When A Win Isn’t A Win

We are coming up one the 1 year anniversary of one of the odder things that has happened in college tennis in the last several years.Last year on March 28th, Illinois and Penn State played an exhausting dual match in State College that lasted just under 6 hours (4 indoor courts) and ended with the Illini coming out on top thanks to Julian Childers coming back from a set down to win in 3. After the match each coach praised the other team and talked about how great a match it was – I mean why wouldn’t they after spending almost 6 hours together. So why is all this so strange?  It’s strange because 5 days later the Big 10 overturned the...