TULSA, Okla. – It was a thrilling day in Tulsa at the ITA All-American Championships for the Vanderbilt men’s tennis team.
Gonzales Austin kicked things off defeating UCLA’s No. 45 Gage Brymer in the first round of main draw action. The senior battled his way through the entire first set with both opponents consistently holding serve. Austin’s resilience paid off winning the match, 7-6, 3-6, 6-2.
“It was a good day. A.J. (Austin) played a very high level match against a guy that can flat out play”, said associate head coach Jamie Hunt. “A.J. played with incredible composure throughout the entire match. He had some missed opportunities, but kept with it and persevered.”
Austin advances to the round of 32, taking on No. 98 Dominik Koepfer of Tulane University. Koepfer went 21-8 for the Greenwave last season, playing primarily in the No. 1 spot.
The newly found doubles team of No. 22 Rhys Johnson and Gonzales Austin earned a fantastic win this evening, beating the No. 2 doubles team in the country and No. 2 seed of the tournament, Ross Guignon and Tim Kopinski, 6-4, 6-3.
“In doubles AJ and Rhys played their best match together as a team so far. Any time you beat the No. 2 team in the country you did a lot of things right. This was a big win that should help their rankings quite a bit. I’m happy for them.”
Johnson and Austin square off against Kevin Metka and Ralf Steinbach of Ohio State in the round of 16. Ketka and Steinbach are currently ranked No. 16 by the ITA and were runners up at the 2014 NCAA doubles championship. In last year’s ITA All-American Metka and Steinbach were defeated by Johnson and Austin’s first round foes, Guignon and Kopinski in doubles consolation play.
Austin begins his match play at 9 a.m. tomorrow, with Johnson joining him at 1:30.
