Nov. 5, 2008
NOTRE DAME, Ind. – The Irish men’s tennis team will travel to Virginia to close out their fall schedule. Senior Brett Helgeson (Overland Park, Kan./Blue Valley West) will take part in the ITA Indoors, starting with a match on Thursday, November 6. The remaining members of the Notre Dame travelling contingent will participate in the William & Mary Invitational, slated to take place from November 7-9.
On the ITA circuit this fall, Helgeson has participated in the main draw of the ITA All American Championships in Tulsa, Okla. as well as the main draw of the ITA Midwest Regionals. At the All American Championships, Helgeson made a run to the round of 16, ultimately falling to number-one seeded Oleksandr Nedevyesov of Oklahoma State, 2-6, 2-6.
At the Midwest Regionals, Helgeson, #25 in the preseason ITA rankings, Helgeson made it to the quarterfinals before falling to Marek Michalicka of Wisconsin, 3-6, 5-7. Helgeson, who was the number four seed in the tournament, made it to the quarterfinals with a win over Roy Kalmanovich of Illinois, 6-2, 6-1, marking his third consecutive straight-set win at the event.
The National Indoors Championships are the second of three national tournaments administered by the Intercollegiate Tennis Association (ITA) during the 2008-09 academic year. The University of Virginia is hosting the championships at the Boar’s Head Sports Club in Charlottesville, Va. The men’s singles bracket will play first, with the opening round scheduled to begin at 10:00 a.m. ET on Thursday. Helgeson will meet fourth-seeded Alex Clayton of Stanford in the first round.
Led by senior captain Santiago Montoya (Austin, Texas/St. Stephen’s Episcopal School), the rest of the Irish contingent will play in the William & Mary Invitational. The invite marks Notre Dame’s third team tournament of the fall season, and first since hosting the Tom Fallon Invitational on October 10-12. It is being held at William & Mary’s McCormack-Nagelsen Tennis Center in Williamsburgh, Va.
Aside from featuring the William and Mary Tribe, the flighted tournament will also include Maryland and the College of Charleston. The invite will be organized as six singles flights and three doubles flights. Each player/doubles team will earn points for victories amassed in each flight. The players/teams with the top point totals at the conclusion of the tournament will be named to the event’s All-Tournament Team.
Vying for a place on the All-Tournament team will be six sophomores including Daniel Stahl (Bethesda, Md./Walt Whitman), Stephen Havens (Cincinnati, Ohio/Hill Christian School), David Anderson (Sandwich, Mass./Sandwich), Tyler Davis (Nashville, Tenn./Father Ryan), Matt Johnson (Portage, Mich./Portage Central) and Sean Tan (Lakewood, Calif./Lakewood). Freshmen Niall Fitzgerald (Wicklow, Ireland/Blackrock College) and Casey Watt (Gibsonia, Pa./Pine-Richland) will also be looking to secure All-Tournament honors.
The tournament gets underway at 8 a.m. on Friday, Nov. 7 with singles competition. Doubles play is slated to start at 5 p.m. on Friday. On Saturday, Nov. 8, singles competition begins at 9 a.m., followed by two rounds of doubles play, beginning at 3 p.m. The schedule for Sunday, Nov. 9, will begin at 9 a.m. with doubles followed by singles competition at 10 a.m.