ORLANDO, Fla. (UCFKnights.com) – The No. 29 UCF men’s tennis team will have three participants in the NCAA Singles and Doubles Championships this season which takes place at the UCF Collegiate Tennis Center at the USTA National Campus from May 20-25.
Sophomore Gabriel Decamps will participate in the NCAA Singles Championships as an at-large selection. The freshmen doubles tandem of Bogdan Pavel and Trey Hilderbrand earned their way into the NCAA Doubles Championships as an automatic qualifier for being the highest ranked pair in the American Athletic Conference.
Decamps is currently ranked No. 41 in the nation in the Oracle/ITA singles rankings and has competed against some of the best players in the nation this season. Of all the talented teams the Knights faced, Decamps saw the best of them at the top singles spot in the lineup. Decamps picked up 13 decisions at the No. 1 position, with one of those wins coming against the No. 9 player in the nation. He has only finished four of his last ten matches, going 2-2 during that span. Overal, he has a 6-7 record.
Pavel and Hilderbrand have been on a hot streak heading for the postseason. UCF’s top doubles duo is 15-3 this season and have strung together nine consecutive victories. Against ranked opposition, they have gone 8-1 with their only loss coming to the No. 4 pair in the nation. That was Pavel and Hilderbrand’s last loss, falling in a tight tiebreaker to De La Basse and Nemeth from Penn State 7-6 (7-5) back on March 8. The highest ranking that UCF’s top tandem defeated was the No. 19 pair from South Alabama. Pavel and Hilderbrand currently sit at No. 14 in the Oracle/ITA doubles rankings.
UP NEXT
The Knights as a team will play the Florida State Seminoles in the first round of the NCAA Tournament on Friday at noon in Gainesville, Fla.