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Men’s Tennis Earns Highest Team Ranking Ever: No. 3 1/14/2004
Men’s Tennis Earns Highest Team Ranking Ever: No. 3 The Vanderbilt men’s tennis team has earned a ranking of No. 3 in the first poll of the 2004 season, released today by the Intercollegiate Tennis Association. The Commodores return five starters from a squad that won the SEC Tournamnent and advanced to the NCAA Championship match in 2003. The No. 3 ranking is the highest ever achieved by the Commodores, who finished 2003 in a tie for fourth place. The Commodores share the third place distinction with SEC-rival Florida. Individually, junior Matt Lockin leads the Commodores at No. 27. Lockin won the 2003 Southern Intercollegiate Championship on his way to a 5-2 fall record. Senior Zach Dailey and junior Scott Brown are ranked No. 45 and No. 46, respectively. Dailey posted a team-best 8-3 record in the fall, while Brown went 7-3 and advanced to the main draw of the ITA All-American Championships. Senior Chad Harris rounds out the ranked Commodores at No. 55. Harris entered the fall at No. 6, but was forced to sit out most of the fall schedule due to injury. Harris is still projected to play No. 1 in the Commodores’ dual-match lineup. In doubles, the pairing of Dailey and fellow-senior Lewis Smith was tabbed as the 45th-ranked doubles team in the country. The duo went 4-2 while playing a pair of fall tournaments together. Members of the third-ranked Commodores will take part in the Southeastern Conference Indoor Championship this weekend in Athens, Ga. The tournament begins with qualifying rounds Thursday and the champion will be crowned on Monday. Vanderbilt’s Bobby Reynolds won the 2003 SEC Indoor championship, and the Commodores will be looking to keep the title in Nashville. TEAM 1 Illinois 2 Baylor T3 Vanderbilt T3 Florida 5 Stanford 6 Mississippi 7 UCLA 8 Duke 9 Texas A&M 10 Kentucky SINGLES 1 Jeremy Wurtzman, Ohio State University 2 Alex Vlaski, University of Washington 3 Benedikt Dorsch, Baylor University 4 Romain Ambert, Mississippi State University 5 Benjamin Becker, Baylor University 6 Bo Hodge, Univ. of Georgia 7 Ludovic Walter, Duke University 8 Michael Kogan, Tulane University 9 Janne Holmia, Univ. of Florida 10 Conor Niland, California DOUBLES 1 Lester Cook / Ante Matijevic Texas A&M University 2 Jason Zimmerman / Ludovic Walter Duke University 3 William Barker / Richard Barker Rice University 4 Zoltan Csanadi / Izak van der Merwe Old Dominion University 5 Bo Hodge / John Isner Univ. of Georgia |
