Virginia men’s tennis continues its NCAA team title defense at the NCAA Championships, being held at the Case Tennis Center in Tulsa, Okla., where the final 16 teams will compete for the national championship May 20-24.
No. 1 seed Virginia (26-4) will face No. 16 Oklahoma State (20-7) on Friday, May 20 at 1 p.m. ET. The winner will advance to the quarterfinals to face the winner of No. 9 Florida (20-6) and SMU (22-8) on Sunday, May 22 at 1 p.m. ET. The men’s semifinals will take place on Monday, May 23 at 5 p.m. ET with the championship match scheduled for Tuesday, May 24 at 5 p.m.
Live scoring and video for the matches will be available with the links posted on VirginiaSports.com.
The defending national champion Cavaliers have advanced to the Round of 16 each of the last 13 years and are looking for their 12th-straight trip to the quarterfinals. Virginia has won two titles in the last four years (2013 and 2015) and has reached the semifinals in eight of the last nine seasons. The Cavaliers are 51-10 in the NCAA Tournament under head coach Brian Boland.
This is the fifth time the Cavaliers enter the tournament as the top-ranked team in the nation, but the first time since 2011. Virginia was the No. 3 seed in the two years it won the title.
Virginia had a conference-best six players earn All-ACC honors this year and have five Cavaliers slated to play in the NCAA Individual Championships. Senior Ryan Shane (Falls Church, Va.), an All-ACC First Team member, was named the ITA Atlantic Region Senior Player of the Year as well as the ITA Atlantic Region Arthur Ashe Award winner. Shane will be the No. 8 seed in the NCAA singles championship and the No. 4 seed in doubles.
Junior Luca Corinteli (Alexandria, Va.), Shane’s doubles partner, earned his first career All-ACC honor, being voted to the third team. Corinteli is 10-3 in singles in spring dual matches in addition to his 14-6 record at No. 1 doubles.
Junior Thai-Son Kwiatkowski (Charlotte, N.C.) comes into the NCAA Round of 16 with 97 career singles victories at UVA. Kwiatkowski, like Shane, will be playing in both the NCAA singles and doubles tournaments in Tulsa, and is currently ranked No. 9 in singles and No. 16 in doubles. Kwiatkowski, an All-ACC Second Team member, is 33-7 in singles this season, including a 14-1 mark at No. 3, and 16-3 at No. 2 doubles with partner senior Mac Styslinger (Birmingham, Ala.). Kwiatkowski is 8-1 in his career in singles in NCAA dual matches and 6-1 in doubles. Styslinger, the 2013 NCAA Doubles champion, is 12-2 in doubles in NCAA dual matches.
Sophomore Collin Altamirano (Sacramento, Calif.) was named the ITA Atlantic Region Player to Watch after being named to the All-ACC Second Team with a 23-4 singles record this spring, including a 13-2 mark at No. 2. Altamirano was 4-0 last season in singles matches in the NCAA tournament and 5-1 in doubles.
Sophomore Henrik Wiersholm (Kirkland, Wash.), an All-ACC Third Team honoree, is 22-2 in singles this spring. Junior J.C. Aragone (Yorba Linda, Calif.), who was also named to the All-ACC Third Team, is 23-3 in singles this spring. Aragone is 6-1 in his career in NCAA tournament singles matches, including winning the deciding match against Penn State that earned UVA a spot in the Round of 16, and 6-1 in doubles.
Sophomore Alexander Ritschard (Zurich, Switzerland) had been sidelined all spring with a shoulder injury, but returned to the court for the NCAA regional matches. Ritschard won both of his matches, improving to 10-0 in singles this season.
Virginia assistant coach Dustin Taylor was a standout collegiate player at The University of Tulsa, the host-site for this year’s Championship. Taylor was a four-time All-Western Athletic Conference honoree and a 2003 All-American. Taylor participated in four NCAA individual championships, highlighted by reaching the quarterfinals of the 2003 NCAA Doubles Championship. In 2004, he was named the ITA/Farnsworth Central Region Senior Player of the Year.
Kwiatkowski and Styslinger won the ITA All-American doubles championship at the Case Tennis Center back in October. Kwiatkowski also won the ITA All-American singles title in Tulsa, becoming the first player since 2009 and fourth in the history of the ITA Men’s All-American to win both titles in the same year.
Oklahoma State is in the Round of 16 for the first time since 2008. The Cowboys secured their trip to Tulsa after 4-0 victories over Bryant and Arkansas in the Regional. No. 56 Julian Cash is the lone ranked Cowboy in singles. Arjun Kadhe and Julain Cash are the No. 10 doubles team while Lucas Gerch and Temur Ismailov are No. 90. Cash was named the ITA Central Region Player to Watch.
This will be the first-ever meeting between Oklahoma State and Virginia.
During the championships, all matches will be stopped after the doubles point is decided. All remaining individual matches will be stopped once a team winner (four points won) has been determined. The score will only reflect completed matches.
Support AFP
Share
Chris Graham
