After shutting out William and Mary 7-0 Wednesday, the Virginia men's tennis team will get a much tougher challenge this weekend when they face off against two ranked opponents.
Notre Dame will get the first shot at the Cavaliers tonight, coming to Charlottesville ranked 13th and hoping to upset the No. 8 Virginia team. Virginia's top two players, junior Somdev Devvarman, and junior Treat Huey, who are ranked 8th and 10th respectively, will face off against Notre Dame's top pair; senior Stephen Bass and Junior Sheeva Parbhu, who are ranked 14th and 30th respectively. The Fighting Irish will counter the Cavaliers' No. 7 doubles pair of Huey and Devvarman with their own No. 11 pair of Parbhu and senior Ryan Keckly.
One of the highlights of Virginia's win over William and Mary Wednesday was an upset scored by freshman Dominic Inglot, who upended No. 49 Alex Cojanu 6-3, 7-6(2). In the match Wednesday, only one of the singles matches, senior Marko Miklo's, went to three sets. Notre Dame will most likely present a much tougher challenge for the Cavaliers. The match tonight, however, represents Notre Dame's first dual match of the year. Considering all of the tournament's players are involved during the off-season, it is unlikely the Fighting Irish will come in very rusty. But it's entirely possible that Virginia could capitalize on a nervous Notre Dame team playing their first game on the road against a top ten team.
"We've always had at least 5-600 people watch us." Devvarman said. "Especially in the doubles point when it gets all loud and doubles goes by so fast, that one point matters, so definitely a big advantage to play at home."
The Notre Dame match tonight should be a good tune-up for the Cavaliers heading into a revenge match Sunday against the University of Illinois. Virginia lost to the Fighting Illini in Champaign last year 5-2. But gaining revenge against Illinois won't be an easy task. Illinois has already defeated one top-ranked opponent so far this season, knocking off defending NCAA champion and No. 10 Pepperdine on January 19th. The Fighting Illini received big games in that match from their strong junior class, who took four of the six singles matches. Junior Kevin Anderson was named Big Ten Athlete of the Week. Juniors Ryan Rowe, Reuben Gonzale, and Brandon Davis all won their matches in straight sets. Rowe and Anderson are ranked 11th and 23rd in the country respectively. Huey and Devvarman will most likely face off against the two top ranked Illinois players and should be favored to win both matches.
Virginia's freshmen will be the key in this match. Virginia coach Brian Boland was pleased with the freshmen in their match on Wednesday.
"I thought [the freshmen] played extremely well," Boland said. "They were able to kind of do a better job as the match went on composing themselves. I couldn't have been more pleased, particularly with Houston Barrick."
The strong junior class of Illinois presents a more daunting challenge. The young Cavaliers will have to display a lot of maturity and try not to focus on mistakes if they want to upend the more experienced Illinois team.
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