
Owls Ready for First Step
4/21/2016 12:00:00 AM | Men's Tennis
By Chuck Pool (cpool@rice.edu)
After a regular season filled with milestones, the 26th ranked Rice men's tennis team hopes to add another this weekend by capturing their first Conference USA title since 2010. In order to take the first step towards that goal, they will need to defeat the team that ended their 2015 season.
The Owls, who come into the tournament as the top seed, will face defending C-USA champion UTSA at 2 p.m. at the George R. Brown Tennis Center. The Roadrunners defeated the Owls last year 4-2 in the championship match after earlier downing the Owls in the first ever match at the GRBTC in January.
While the Owls may have gained some small measure of payback for the two losses in a regular season 4-0 win, Rice head coach Efe Ustundag said he hopes the results from last year keep his team focused and able to engineer a quick start to the weekend.
"All season, we have shown that when we bring the right mindset to the court, we can be very successful," Ustundag said. "But we have also shown that we do not have a large margin for error. If we are not focused you can have results like we had at Lamar two weeks ago."
One day before a showdown with then No. 25 SMU, the Owls were ambushed by a hard-charging Cardinals squad, 4-1 in Beaumont. They rebounded the next day with one of their most impressive showings to date in a 4-2 win over the Mustangs, proving ample evidence to Ustundag's words.
"The most important thing when you get to the conference tournament is to go out, take care of business and get off the court. It's important we have the right focus from the first serve on Friday."
Rice enters tournament action with a 20-7 record, its first 20-win season since 2004. The Owls current ranking marks the latest they have been inside the Top 30 since they took a No. 22 ranking into the 2008 conference tourney.
The winner of Friday's matchup will take on the winner of the 2 p.m. meeting between UAB and Southern Miss in a semifinal set for noon on Saturday.
Ironically, all three teams on the Owls side of the bracket are no strangers to the GRBTC, having joined the Owls in the first C-USA Showcase in March. The Owls completed the weekend with a 3-0 mark, while UAB finished 2-1, Southern Miss 1-2 and UTSA 0-3.
This marks the second consecutive year that the GRBTC has hosted a C-USA championship event. The Rice women captured their third consecutive title last year at home. The Rice men last hosted the event in 2010 at Jake Hess Tennis Stadium, winning a memorable battle over Tulsa to take the crown.
Rice also hosted the C-USA tourney at home in 2007.
Ustundag hopes that the kind of support that has boosted the Owls to a 19-1 home record during the 2016 regular season is in evidence this weekend.
"Starting with the Double Trouble match with LSU in January, we have had some great crowds and our guys feed off of that energy. Last weekend against Tulane was the latest example of our crowd giving the team the extra push they needed for a great performance."
Winners of Saturday's semifinals will meet for the championship at 11 a.m. on Sunday. Admission is free all weekend.