Illinois men's tennis will travel to Florida over spring break to play Fairleigh Dickinson, #4 Florida and UCF over spring break.
Last Time Out
Against UIC, Illinois picked up the doubles point with wins on courts 2 and 3. Alex Brown and Gabrielius Guzauskas defeated Bank/Strandberg 6-1 followed by Siphosothando Montsi and Olivier Stuart defeating Wazir/Fruzel 6-2 on court 2. Illinois completed the sweep with wins by Hunter Heck, Nic Meister. Montsi clinched the match on 2.
Illinois followed the UIC with a hard fought battle with the No. 1 ranked TCU. Illinois took courts 1 and 2 to tiebreakers and Brown and Guzauskas lost 7-5 on court three. TCU secured the doubles point on court one 7-6(5) over Heck/Horve.
Heck and Nic Meister won singles matches for the Illini. Heck defeated #23 Fearnley 6-3,6-1 on court 4 to put Illinois on the board. Mesiter defeated Jirousek 6-2,3-6,6-1 to make the score 3-2. Jong clinched the match for TCU on court 3.
During Friday's night matchup the Illini won the doubles point over the bears. Brown and Guzauskas defeated Muza/Paroulek 6-2 on court three, Heck and Horve went into a 11 point tiebreaker on court 1 to win the doubles point. Baylor won four singles matches and clinched on 6.
In The Rankings
In the singles rankings, released Wed. (March 9) graduate transfer Olivier Stuart moved No. 62 and Hunter Heck cracked the top 120 at no. 117. The doubles pairing of Hunter Heck and Lucas Horve moved up to a a career-best No. 40.
Key Pieces Return
Alex Brown, Hunter Heck, Kweisi Kenyatte, and Siphosothando Montsi all return to the team in 2022. Brown was an All-American in 2020 and played doubles no. 1 and singles no. 2 for Illinois last season. Monsti, who reached the Sweet 16 last season in the singles tournament and was named and All-American after posting a 16-3 singles record during the season is back. Kenyatte missed the second half of the season with an injury but had a couple key wins for Illinois including in their season opening upset of No. 1 USC. After a successful freshman season where his comeback win 0-6, 6-3, 7-5 against JJ Tracy who had been undefeated until then gave Illinois a point in the Big Ten Championship.
New Faces
Last season fifth year seniors Zeke Clark, Aleks Kovacevic, and Noe Khilf played big roles in the teams success. To fill the holes left but the graduated senior Brad Dancer and assistant coach March Asse brought in four new Illini. The first was Mercer transfer Olivier Stuart who played four years at Mercer before sitting out last season and transferred to the Illini. Stuart is joined by freshmen Gabrielius Guzauskas, Will Mroz and Karlis Ozolins.
B1G Champs
Illinois was the first Big Ten West Division Title winner last season. Following the regular season championship Illinois was a no. 1 seed in the Big Ten tournament. The defeated Indiana 4-0 before matching up against Michigan in the semifinals. Illinois battled back to defeated the Wolverines 4-2. In the finals they were up against OSU, who they lost two in the regular season. The match lasted over three hours and the Illinois came out with the 4-3 win.
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