Men's Tennis Prepares for 2009 NCAA Tournament
April 27, 2009
By Alex Oppenheimer
The No. 25 University of Miami men’s tennis team awaits Tuesday’s NCAA Selection Show to find out its opponent for the opening rounds of the NCAA Tournament, beginning on May 8 at select campus sites.
Finishing second in the ACC with a 9-2 regular-season mark, the Hurricanes advanced to the semifinals of the ACC Championship where they fell to Wake Forest. However, the team has continued to work hard towards the NCAA Tournament.
“With our conference being so strong and playing good teams on the road, I thought that was a positive to finish at 9-2. We lost a pair of close matches to Virginia and FSU, but in the end, it was a pretty good regular season,” said fifth-year head coach Mario Rincon. “As a two-seed at ACCs, we wanted to get to the finals. We had beaten Wake Forest earlier in the season and we had our chances to win that match. Everything was going our way and then we let it get away from us.”
Last year, Miami made it to the conference finals as a No. 7 seed and had hoped to get there once again in 2009. “Despite this, I think that we are a very good team, For the NCAA Tournament, we are going to come back stronger and perform better,” said sophomore Carl Sundberg.
Sundberg, along with four-time All-American Daniel Vallverdu, earned All-ACC honors this season. Miami was one of just five schools in the conference to have more than one student-athlete selected.
“I am excited about the award. I feel like I had a good season and played very well during ACC matches,” added Sundberg.
As for Vallverdu, currently ranked No. 12 in the country in singles and No. 41 in doubles with fellow senior David Rosenfeld, this was his fourth-straight All-ACC honor after finishing 17-5 overall and 7-1 in ACC play. Vallverdu bounced back during the spring after sustaining an injury during the ITA National Indoor Championships in November, and has since worked his way back into the top of the lineup.
“It is tough especially when you are out for a long time. I was out for four whole months,” said Vallverdu. “I think Mario did a great job in helping me out because he told me it was only a matter of time and to just keep working at it. I feel like now I am back.”
Vallverdu and his teammates await both their seeding as well as their destination for the upcoming NCAA regional round. “We have been conditioning a lot over the last week and will start playing full-speed tennis again this week. Our first goal is to win our first two matches at the regional to make it to the Sweet 16. After that, we will set our new goal”, added Vallverdu.
Along with Vallverdu and Sundberg, sophomore Keith Crowley has been an important part of the team’s ACC success. Crowley is currently tied for the team lead in wins with freshman Ignacio Taboada with a record of 22-7. He has won seven-straight singles matches and four-straight doubles matches, all versus ACC opponents.
“My dad had booked a ticket from South Africa during the middle of the season, and at that time I was technically playing at seventh singles. When he got here, I just turned things around and worked back up,” said Crowley of his midseason turnaround.
Crowley looks to be another prominent factor for Miami to rebound and make a mark in this month’s tournament. “The chemistry is there; the talent is there; we just need to go out in each position and do the job,” added Crowley.
As a team, Miami has won eight of their last 10 matches dating back to a 4-3 win at North Carolina on March 20. The Hurricanes look to have the pieces in place in both singles and doubles; it is just a matter of competing and closing matches out when opportunity knocks.
“I know that wherever we go, we will need to beat somebody good,” said Rincon. “We want to get to College Station.”
The 2009 NCAA Men’s Tennis Selection Show will air on ESPNEWS on Tuesday, April 28, at approximately 5:20 p.m. The 64 teams and the 16 regional host sites for both the men’s and women’s tournaments will be announced. The 16 regional winners advance to College Station, Texas, for the Round of 16 beginning on Thursday, May 14.
In addition, the 64 singles players and 32 doubles teams per gender selected to compete in the NCAA Singles and Doubles Championships will be posted to the NCAA website on the evening of Wednesday, April 29.
