The American Athletic Conference Men’s Tennis Championship Returns to Tulsa’s Michael D. Case Tennis Center

Thursday, April 18

Tulsa, Okla.

1:00 p.m.

Tulsa

(12) Wichita State

Photo by: Paris Moua

The American Athletic Conference Men’s Tennis Championship Returns to Tulsa’s Michael D. Case Tennis Center

4/17/2024 4:08:00 PM | Men's Tennis

Championship Page Live Stats Live Stream Notes (PDF)

COACH WESTBROOK INTERVIEW

TULSA, Okla. — For the third time in its 10-year history, the American Athletic Conference Men's Tennis Championship will be hosted by The University of Tulsa at the Michael D. Case Tennis Center this week, April 18-21. The No. 5 seed Golden Hurricane will play 12^th-seed Wichita State (5-17) in the first round with a 1 p.m. start time.

It will be a different look to the tournament this year as the conference has 12 tennis-playing schools, an increase of four from a year ago. The new teams include Charlotte, FAU, Rice, UAB and UTSA.

"Rice has always been a tough opponent of ours when we played together as members of Conference USA," said Tulsa Head Coach Vince Westbrook. "In C-USA, it was normally Rice, Tulsa, SMU and Memphis. Now with teams like FAU, UTSA and Charlotte, fans will see that this conference has a lot more depth with 12 teams."

The 12-team tournament begins with Thursday's four first-round matches and continues through the Sunday final. The winner of the men's championship will earn The American's automatic bid to the NCAA Division I Tennis Championships at Oklahoma State's Greenwood Tennis Center in Stillwater.

The key to any tournament is win and advance and that's what each of the 12 schools will attempt to do at the Case Tennis Center this week, and for Tulsa it will come down to consistency and discipline.

"Consistency, first of all, and secondly discipline is what we'll need this week. We can't come out and be loose in the doubles, win a bunch of first sets and then drag a match out for 3-3.5 hours because it will hurt us the next day," said Westbrook.

Seedings for the championship were determined by ITA team rankings through the matches of Monday, April 15. Tulsa is seeded fifth for a second consecutive year and will be looking to become the first five-seed to win the tournament. As the league's top-ranked team at No. 32, Memphis was granted the one-seed with No. 40 SMU earning the second seed, No. 45 Florida Atlantic received the three-seed and No. 53 Rice took the fourth seed.

Tulsa will be looking for its 17^th conference title and first AAC crown in its 10^th season as a league member. The Hurricane has come within one match of The American title twice in 2015 and 2016, both times as the No. 2 seed falling to top-seeded South Florida in 4-0 decisions. In his 33^rd year leading the Tulsa men, Vince Westbrook seeks his 10^th league title to go with his two Missouri Valley Conference crowns and seven Conference-USA titles.

Tulsa enters the conference championship as healthy as they've been in some time.

"It's nice to know going into this championship that we have a fighting chance with our full lineup now healthy. Guys are now playing in their spots. We've shown at times that when we have our full lineup, we're able to compete with anybody," said Westbrook. "I think being at home gives us a big advantage. If you look how the weather will be – we could be playing inside or outside, we'll be playing in wind, the temperatures will drop. Welcome to Oklahoma."

This will be the 48th meeting in the 47-year-long rivalry between Tulsa and Wichita State. Although the Shockers lead the series 25-22, Tulsa has won 19 of the last 21 meetings, including the last five matches and an April 1 meeting in Wichita that ended in a 4-0 victory for Tulsa.

Wichita State, seeded No. 12, finished the regular season with a 5-17 record. Tulsa and Wichita State have met in The American Championship only once since the Shockers joined the league in 2017. The fifth-seeded Shockers captured a 4-2 win over the four-seed Hurricane in the 2019 quarterfinals.

The Shockers have three players with double figure wins in singles play, including Marcelo Sepulveda (10-13), Alejandro Jacome (13-14) and Vanja Hodzic (15-12). In doubles play, Wichita State tandems have combined for only 15 wins in the dual-match season—five wins in each of the three positions. Misha Kvantaliani and Richey King have been the consistent No. 1 pair for the Shockers, sitting at 5-12 on the year.

Each of Tulsa's active players in the singles lineup have reached 10 or more total wins this year, including four who have recorded 11 wins in the dual-match season. They are Pierce Rollins (11-10), Thiago Pernas (11-5), Callum Gale (11-8) and Timothy Carlsson Seger (11-7).

Rollins, the reigning back-to-back AAC Player of the Week and the nation's No. 82-ranked player in the latest ITA singles rankings, has held down the No. 1 position all season long for the Hurricane. The Tulsa native transferred from Texas A&M over the offseason after his senior year and has faced some of the toughest competition in the country. He has claimed four wins against the nine nationally ranked opponents he's faced, including No. 33 Trevor Svajda (SMU), No. 55 Pablo Alemany (Memphis), No. 55 Alvin Tudorica (South Florida) and No. 69 Paul Inchauspe (Princeton).

Pernas has been a consistent performer for the men as the primary starter in the second position. After helping East Tennessee State win the SoCon title as a redshirt junior a year ago, Pernas has been reliable as of late with five of his last six matches as Tulsa's No. 2 player.

Primarily the No. 3 singles player for TU, Gale is enjoying his best year as a senior. He has faced ranked opponents six times this year and is 6-3 in his last 10 outings heading into the tournament.

Finally, Seger has been Tulsa's go-to in the fourth and fifth positions, filling in where needed. The Taby, Sweden, product has handled the workload increase gracefully in his sophomore season, having appeared in all the Hurricane's dual matches this season compared to only 13 last year. He earned his first ranked victory against Oklahoma's Luis Alvarez (No. 89) on Feb. 4.

Rollins and Seger are ranked No. 41 in the latest ITA doubles poll. The duo competed together in the fall and have held the top spot in the lineup since the Arkansas match (Feb. 21). They continue to maintain TU's best doubles record of 14-7 and 9-5 in dual matches, including a 4-2 mark against other nationally ranked tandems.

Callum Gale will team up with Gus Tettamble to form one of the three doubles pairings for the Hurricane, while a pair of true freshmen Alex Okonkwo and Victor Tosetto have made a reliable connection in the Hurricane's doubles lineup. After starting 2-2, the duo has won eight of their last 10 matches to improve to 12-4 overall at the No. 3 position.

THE AMERICAN CHAMPIONSHIP SCHEDULE
First Round • Thursday, April 18
Match 1: No. 10 Tulane vs. No. 7 UTSA, 9 a.m.
Match 2: No. 11 Temple vs. No. 6 Charlotte, 9 a.m.
Match 3: No. 12 Wichita State vs. No. 5 Tulsa, 1 p.m.
Match 4: No. 9 UAB vs. No. 8 South Florida, 1 p.m.

Quarterfinals • Friday, April 19
Match 5: Tulane/UTSA winner vs. No. 2 SMU, 10 a.m.
Match 6: Temple/Charlotte winner vs. No. 3 FAU, 10 a.m.
Match 7: WSU/Tulsa winner vs. No. 4 Rice, 2 p.m.
Match 8: UAB/USF winner vs. No. 1 Memphis, 2 p.m.

Semifinals • Saturday, April 20
Match 9: Match 5 winner vs. Match 6 winner, 12 p.m.
Match 10: Match 7 winner vs. Match 8 winner, 12 p.m.

Championship • Sunday, April 21
Semifinal winners, 12 p.m. (ESPN+)