University of Minnesota Athletics
Gophers Look to Make Noise at Big Ten Tourney
4/28/2010 12:00:00 AM | Men's Tennis
Border rival Wisconsin is Minnesota's first obstacle in its quest for a Big Ten men's tennis tournament championship this weekend in Bloomington, Ind.
The Gophers and Badgers will meet in a quarterfinal showdown on Friday at 10:30 a.m. (Eastern time). Wisconsin is seeded fourth in the tournament and Minnesota is the fifth seed by virtue of the Badgers' 5-2 dual meet win over the Gophers on April 19 in Minneapolis. Both teams are also highly touted in the recent national rankings as Wisconsin is ranked 27th and Minnesota is ranked 32nd. Both are also in good shape to receive NCAA tournament bids when the field is announced on Tuesday, May 4.
The Gophers take a 13-9 overall record into the weekend with the 27th-ranked Badgers being the lowest-ranked team to defeat them this season. Minnesota has played 10 of its 22 matches against top 30 teams and 17 of its matches overall have been against ranked foes.
Sebastian Gallego has won five straight matches to improve to 19-10 for the season. Gallego is ranked 64th in the country and has five wins over ranked opponents. Tobias Wernet is 19-13 overall and ranked 106th in the nation with four wins over ranked foes. Wernet, Phillip Arndt and Brendan Ruddock all went 6-4 in Big Ten dual matches this spring.
Wisconsin is 18-6 overall and nearly knocked off fourth-ranked Ohio State on Sunday, suffering a 4-3 loss to the Buckeyes, who have won 59 straight Big Ten matches. The match came down to the third set in the deciding match before Ohio State finally prevailed. The Buckeyes are the top seed in the Big Ten tournament and will likely be the opponent for either the Gophers or the Badgers in Saturday's semifinals.
Wisconsin has an outstanding tandem in senior Moritz Baumann and junior Marek Michalicka. The pair is ranked 14th in the country in doubles, while Baumann is 22nd in singles and Michalicka is ranked 28th.
The last time the teams met in the Big Ten tournament was a memorable contest that saw Wisconsin pull out a 4-3 victory in the 2008 quarterfinals at Iowa. The match had four lengthy three-set singles matches and eventually ended at 1:11 a.m.
Minnesota lost its Big Ten tournament opener to Indiana in last year's quarterfinals as the third seed. The Gophers have not reached the Big Ten tournament championship match since 2002 and have not won the event since 1995. Top-seeded Ohio State is the four-time defending champion as the Buckeyes and Illinois have combined to win the past 13 titles.
Players Mentioned
