Men's Tennis Signs Pair for 2017
11/15/2016 12:00:00 AM | Men's Tennis
By Chuck Pool (cpool@Rice.edu) -
The Rice men's tennis team has added two standout recruits who will join the defending Conference USA champions for the 2017-18 season.
The Owls have signed Jacob Eskeland from Oslo, Norway and Mohamed Abdel-Aziz of Eaglescliffe, England national letters of intent.
Eskeland has been ranked as high as fourth in Norway and represented his country in Davis Cup and has a career-best ITF ranking of 448. He reached the finals of a pair of ITF Grade 4 tournaments this past year.
"We are very excited about adding Jacob to our 2017 class," Rice head coach Efe Ustundag said. "We are getting a guy with a big game and big potential. He has been consistently one of the best juniors in Norway and I expect him to still improve a ton between now and his enrollment in August. He is a very technically sound player with a big serve and aggressive game style. We look forward to having him join the family and make an impact right away."
Abdel-Aziz has a career-best ITF junior ranking of 195 and has been a finalist in a pair of ITF tournaments in singles and another in doubles as well as reaching the quarterfinals in a Futures tournament in Sharm El Sheikah, Egypt this past year.
"Mohamed is a fiery player who will train hard and fight hard every day," Ustundag said. "Mohamed will make everyone around him better. He has played a lot of tournaments over the last couple of years and I expect that to continue the next 9-10 months. He will arrive on campus match ready and will also be an impact player.
"The most important part of this recruiting class is that we are getting great character guys with a professional work ethic," Ustundag stated. "They both have big goals to accomplish on the court and with their attitude coupled with the training and the environment they will be in, I expect them to reach their goals while at Rice. A very exciting class that should help us reload after graduating a very productive and high level seniors this year."
Ustundag's current group of Owls will being the defense of their C-USA title with the opening of the 2017 dual season on January 14 when they host Lamar and Texas Rio Grande Valley in a doubleheader. .