PROVO, Utah (April 5th 2005)--It's the first and last home conference matches of year for the No. 55 BYU men's tennis team.
In a three-match weekend, the Cougars take on rival and No. 63 Utah on Thursday at 1:30, followed by No. 59 New Mexico on Friday at 1:30 and end with No. 68 Air Force on Saturday at the same time.
This tripleheader marks the final conference matches for BYU before the tournament begins in San Diego on the 28th of April. BYU is in 2nd place in the Mountain West Conference with their 1-1 conference record. The Cougars got a huge win over then No. 40 UNLV last Friday. Their only conference loss was a tight 4-3 loss to SDSU.
BYU is one of the Mountain West Conference's most improved teams. At the same point in the season last year, the Cougars were 6-13 as opposed to this years nearly reversed 13-5 record. The men in blue and white have recorded wins over No. 75 UC Irvine, No. 52 Colorado and No. 51 UNLV.
The Cougars are led this year by transfer James Ludlow. Playing at his No. 2 singles slot the sophomore has racked up an impressive 18-8 singles record while teaming up with Dominik Kaufhold to go 18-13 in doubles. Also on fire for BYU their other sophomore Chip Hand. The Southern California native had ripped of 10 straight wins before losing a tough 7-5,6-2 match to SDSU's Christian Groh last week.
The Skinny on the Competition
The University of Utah fell to 0-2 in conference play last week with losses to No. 75 San Diego State and No. 40 UNLV. Overall the Utes post a 12-5 record with wins over No. 70 ranked Montana State University-Bozeman and No. 52 Colorado. This year the Utes are lead by No. 1 singles player Tomasz Grzyb, he posts an overall singles record of 10-13 while going 10-9 doubles.
New Mexico comes to Provo without any conference play under their belts. They recently beat up Santa Clara 6-1 in their final home match of the season. The Lobos are currently 6-5 on the year with their highest ranked win coming over No. 31 Boise State earlier in the year. The Lobos are lead by freshman Max Jones. The England native has gone 22-6 in singles and 15-8 doubles.
Soaring high this year, Air Force flies into Provo to open up their conference season. The Falcons have recorded wins over No. 75 UC Irvine and No. 71 Nebraska on their way to a 14-4 regular season record. The Falcons boast the country's 58th ranked player in the country in Junior Shannon Buck. The former MWC Co-Player of the year has swung his way to a 18-2 singles record and a 21-3 doubles.