No. 11 Men’s Tennis Returns Home to Face UAB and StetsonNo. 11 Men’s Tennis Returns Home to Face UAB and Stetson
Edward Finan / UCF Athletics

No. 11 Men’s Tennis Returns Home to Face UAB and Stetson

by Alex Clough
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ORLANDO - Looking to wind down non-conference play in style, the No. 21 UCF men’s tennis team will take on the UAB and Stetson on their home court this weekend to open a seven-match homestand.

The Knights return home after a strong weekend at the ITA Indoor Championship in Waco, Texas. A big win against No. 4 Ohio State in the first round was followed by a pair of losses to top-10 opponents.

Back in action at the USTA National Campus, the Knights will be determined to defend their unbeaten home record this season of 5-0. The Friday duel against the Blazers will start at 6 p.m., followed by a showdown against the Hatters on Sunday, also at 6 p.m.

LAST TIME OUT

UCF caught plenty of eyes last weekend in their inaugural ITA Indoor Championship. Once again, they showed why they should never be counted out even against the nation's best, upsetting defending champion and fourth-ranked Ohio State, 4-2, on Friday. The Knights have once again earned their highest-ranked win in program history, an achievement they had already picked up this season against No. 6 Arizona.

Ohio State didn’t go down without a fight, with the last three finishing courts of the contest being pushed to three sets. Yassine Dlimi only needed two sets to put his match away however, scoring the first singles point of the contest in his triumph against No. 22 Aidan Kim, 6-3, 6-4.

The rest of the weekend did not give the Knights as many reasons to celebrate in Waco. The men’s tennis team could not manage to get a point on the board against either No. 11 Stanford or No. 9 San Diego.

QUICK HITS

  • UCF secured its third-highest ranking in program history on Thursday as the Knights were tabbed 11th in the nation, marking the fourth time in program history the squad has placed that high. The Black and Gold are among four Big 12 teams in the top 25 and jumped 10 spots from 21st two weeks ago.
  • The Knights have two giant slayers on their roster. In their match against Ohio State, Mehdi Benchakroun and Dlimi collected their first wins against ranked opponents in singles play. On top of Dlimi’s ranked win, Benchakroun took down No. 106 Will Jansen, 6-2, 1-6, 6-4.
  • Dlimi was honored as the Big 12 Conference Player of the Week on Tuesday after a stellar performance at the ITA Indoor Championship. The award goes down as the second of his career and the third time it’s been given to a UCF player this season.
  • UCF has not played a match at home in over a month. Out of their five home wins at the start of the season, the Black and Gold outscored their opponents 28-4, featuring consecutive shutouts in their last two matches at the USTA National Campus.

THE OPPONENTS

UAB

The Blazers will arrive in Orlando with a 4-5 record this season. While they have only won two out of six away matches this year, they have been able to hold down court one in doubles consistently thanks to Noah Malige and Ondrej Valek. Their only two losses together came in a doubleheader against Louisiana State.

Stetson

The Hatters will face off against UAB one day after UCF does. The team out of Deland picked up a solid run of form with four straight wins before falling to Georgia Southern, 1-6. Three of those wins went down to the wire, finishing in a nail-biting scoreline of 4-3. 

Stetson will rely on a safe pair of hands in Xavier Sarda Marti to help get them through this weekend. The Spaniard is on a five-match unbeaten run in singles play, scoring the lone point for the Hatters against Georgia Southern’s Laurent Julia Calac on court five, 6-2, 7-5.