May 20, 2004
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The undefeated and top-ranked Illinois men's tennis team, the favorite to repeat as NCAA titlist, heads to Tulsa, Okla., this week, site of the final four rounds of the 2004 NCAA Division I Men's Tennis Championship Tournament. The first task for the Fighting Illini will be to take on No. 16 Harvard Saturday, May 22 at 3 p.m. CDT in a Round-of-16 match. Four victories in as many days (May 22-25) would earn Illinois its second and the Big Ten's third (Michigan won in 1957) NCAA men's tennis crown; it would also be the first time for a reigning team to repeat as national champion since Stanford won four in a row from 1995-98. Should that happen, this year's Illinois squad would be the fifth to win the title with an undefeated season (Stanford-1978, 1995, 1998; Illinois-2003) since the NCAA went to the team championship format in 1977. Illinois is attempting to become the first team ever to go unbeaten in consecutive years.
This is Illinois' ninth trip as a team to the NCAA Tournament and the team's fifth advancement to the Sweet 16 in the first six years since the expansion of the field to 64 teams. The Illini are 18-7 in NCAA play since they first competed in the post-season event in 1996.
Illini Consistency
Two players from last year's national championship squad departed early for the pros-NCAA singles titlist Amer Delic (a would-be senior) and Rajeev Ram (a would-be sophomore), who won the national doubles championship along with current Illini senior Brian Wilson. Illinois has been remarkably consistent, if not as dominant, this year, despite those losses that might have crippled most college lineups. The Orange and Blue has had four 4-3 wins thus far, as opposed to just one, in the national title match vs. Vanderbilt a year ago. On the other side of the coin, the 2003 Illinois squad posted 17 shutouts, while this year's UI outfit has blanked its opponents on 16 occasions. Illinois has held the nation's No. 1 spot continuously since February, 2003 when it won its first National Indoor title.
Big Ten Dominance
Along the way, Illinois won its eighth consecutive Big Ten regular-season crown and its seventh conference tournament title in the last eight years. The Illini handed Ohio State, another contestant in the NCAA Sweet 16, its only two Big Ten losses this year. Coach Craig Tiley's troops have won 39 consecutive contests against Big Ten foes, and 96 of their last 97 matches against league competition. The Buckeyes are the last Big Ten team to defeat the Illini (4-2)-that took place April 29, 2001 in the conference tournament championship match at Madison, Wis. The 57-match conference winning streak going into that match with OSU remains a Big Ten record.
Fighting Illini players put together a record of 63-8 against Big Ten singles opponents in 2004; in doubles, the mark was 31-5.
Four UI players earned All-Big Ten honors: Brian Wilson and Phil Stolt, who were unanimous picks; and Michael Calkins and Ryler DeHeart. Wilson was chosen the Big Ten Player of the Year. He is the second Illinois player to win that award since its inception in 1987. Oliver Freelove was so honored in 1999. Craig Tiley was the choice for 2004 Big Ten Coach of the Year; it was his fifth such award in the last six seasons. (He was the NCAA Coach of the Year in 1999 and 2003.)
Champaign-Urbana Now on the College Tennis Map
Illinois' success on the national scene has continued this year. Another 2004 milestone for the Orange and Blue was its second ITA National Indoor title, which it won in early February with victories over No. 48 Tulsa, No. 8 Duke, No. 5 Stanford and No. 6 UCLA. Only four teams before Illinois have won back-to-back national indoor championships: Stanford in 1975 and 1976, Southern California in 1987 and 1988, Stanford in 1994 and 1995, and UCLA in 1996 and 1997. Of the 30 National Indoor champions since the event was started in 1973 (it was not held in 1974 and 1981), nine of them have gone on to win the NCAA Championship that same year.
Illinois' current 62-match winning streak is the longest in NCAA Division I men's tennis since the year-end team championship format was put into place in 1977. The Illini tied Stanford's record of 45 March 6 at Iowa and broke the record a week later at Minnesota.
During the streak, the Fighting Illini have beaten 13 Top-10 teams and shut out the opposition on 33 occasions. The Orange and Blue has won 33 home matches in a row. UI has not lost since eventual national champion Southern California ended its season, dealing a 4-2 loss in the national quarterfinals at College Station, Texas, May 19, 2001.
Fighting Illini Individual Highlights
Not only did Illinois win the NCAA team championship a year ago, it made a clean sweep, with former Illini Amer Delic capturing the school's first NCAA singles title and Brian Wilson and former Illini Rajeev Ram winning the doubles crown. A Triple Crown is still a possibility for the Fighting Illini in 2004.
Wilson, who took last fall off from school to compete as an amateur in professional tournaments, has been ranked No. 1 nationally in singles since April 20 (he is Illinois' first-ever player with the No. 1 ranking); he earned the top seed in the NCAA Singles Tournament, which runs from May 26-31 in Tulsa. Wilson recently received the honor of being chosen as one of 10 student-athletes to represent the Intercollegiate Tennis Association (ITA) and collegiate tennis in the United States on a competitive tour in China next month. Tennis legend Stan Smith is the honorary coach for the team, which will play exhibition matches against some of the best players between the ages of 17 and 23 in China June 13-21. The U.S. all-stars were selected by the ITA Board of Directors for their outstanding tennis achievements, as well as for their sportsmanship and ambassadorial qualities.
Phil Stolt, who plays in the No. 2 spot for the Illini, is currently ranked No. 51 and has been ranked as high as No. 20 earlier in the season; he made the field of 64 as well. The New Jersey product , who sat out last fall due to August back surgery, is No. 10 on the all-time Illinois singles career victories list (100-39); he's No. 5 in doubles (97-27). The two seniors are currently ranked No. 5 in doubles; they earned the No. 4 seed in the NCAA Doubles Tournament, and thus have earned All-America status.
One of the major keys to Illinois' success has been its depth. Wilson and Stolt have been instrumental, but so has the rest of the lineup. Ryler DeHeart opened the season on a 12-match winning streak and has been strong ever since; he's been ranked as high as 44th; his top win came against No. 8 Hamid Mirzadeh of Florida.
Michael Calkins, perhaps the least heralded of what Tiley has called "perhaps the best recruiting class in the history of college tennis" (Calkins, Brian Wilson, Phil Stolt and Amer Delic four years ago), is actually the winningest. Not just among the four, but among all players ever to compete at Illinois. He broke Jeff Laski's (1996-2000) school record of 118 doubles victories April 23 against Purdue and beat Oliver Freelove's Illini career mark of 120 singles wins when he defeated Arizona State's Jonathan Kinsella May 16 in the second round of the NCAA Tournament at Urbana, Ill. Calkins, who has been ranked as high as No. 39 this season, brings a 121-33 career singles slate and 122-45 doubles audit to Tulsa.
Chris Martin, a junior, has a 13-match winning streak going, the longest on the Illinois team this season. The Tulsa native is the player who scored the winning point in the dramatic, come-from-behind national championship victory a year ago against Vanderbilt. He has been ranked as high as No. 47 in singles and No. 14 (with Calkins) in doubles this season.
GD Jones has been a key addition to the Illinois team, particularly with the loss of Ram and Delic. He graduated from high school in Auckland, New Zealand in December, and the 17-year-old found himself a half-a-world away just a few weeks later, enrolled at the University of Illinois. He was in the Illini starting lineup just four days after arriving on campus, and promptly won eight of his first nine singles matches. His doubles prowess soon became apparent. When he and DeHeart started playing together in mid-February, they reeled off 16 consecutive victories before finally losing their only match to date in Illinois' most recent contest, a 4-0 victory over Arizona State in NCAA Round 2 action May 16.
The Illini backups have proven to be quite capable as well. Sophomore Pramod Dabir, who won his first three matches this year to extend his Illinois record singles winning streak to 24, has a 19-5 record. He hasn't been available since the April 18 match vs. Michigan because of a suspected stress fracture in his arm, but he has been cleared for duty in Tulsa. Evan Zeder has not seen a lot of action, but he has made the best of the court time he has had. The junior went undefeated during the dual match season (8-0).
Illini Hit the Books
The Illinois tennis team has consistently been one of the top male varsity athletic teams, in terms of academic performance. The squad has won the award for having the best GPA among the UI men's teams on a regular basis. This year, junior Chris Martin earned the award for having the highest grade point average of all Illinois varsity male student-athletes in the junior class. He turned in a 3.8 GPA in Finance. Stolt, another finance major, who graduated earlier this month, earned the Big Ten Medal of Honor, which is given annually at each conference institution to the top male and female student-athlete in terms of excellence in both athletics and academics. Other majors among the Fighting Illini players include speech communication, history, sports management, advertising, business, pre-med and electrical engineering.
