April 18, 2002
CORAL GABLES, Fla. – For the sixth time in seven years in the league, the University of Notre Dame men’s tennis team (19-6) will enter the BIG EAST Championship as the top-seeded team. The 10th-ranked Irish are in pursuit of their third conference title. Notre Dame and Miami have met in the final each of the past six BIG EAST tournaments with the Irish winning in 1996 and 1999. This year, the host Hurricanes are seeded third, behind Notre Dame and Virginia Tech. After receiving a first-round bye, the Irish will play Saturday at 9:00 a.m. against either fourth-seeded Boston College or the fifth seed, Rutgers, at the Neil Schiff Tennis Complex. Notre Dame will then play at Noon on Sunday in either the championship match or the third-place tilt.
LAST WEEK’S ACTION: The Irish split a pair of matches in the final weekend of the regular season, losing 4-1 at home to 16th-ranked Kentucky before defeating Ball State 4-3 on the road. On Saturday, the Wildcats won the doubles point and three of the first four completed singles matches to deny the Irish their first undefeated season at home since 1994. Seniors Casey Smith (Leawood, Kan.) and Javier Taborga (La Paz, Bolivia), ranked fourth nationally in doubles, won at No. 1, while classmate Andrew Laflin (Tampa, Fla.) provided the lone Irish point with a victory at No. 6 singles. Sophomore Matthew Scott (Paris, France) had rallied from a set down to force a third set before his match at No. 5 was abandoned.
On Sunday, Notre Dame finished its regular season with a 4-3 win over Ball State, though the Irish jumped out to a 4-0 lead before dropping three close matches decided more than an hour after the outcome of the match was determined. In doubles, two pairs playing together for the first time in their careers registered victories to give the Irish a 1-0 lead. Smith and classmate Ashok Raju (Morgantown, W. Va.) won at No. 1, while Scott and sophomore Luis Haddock-Morales (Caguas, Puerto Rico) were triumphant at No. 3. In singles, Haddock-Morales, Scott and Laflin provided wins at Nos. 3, 4 and 5, respectively. The win marked the 13th in a row for Notre Dame over the Cardinals.
IRISH IN THE BIG EAST CHAMPIONSHIP: Notre Dame was named the top seed in the 2002 BIG EAST Championship, which will take place Friday through Sunday at the Neil Schiff Tennis Complex in Coral Gables, Fla. For the second year, the format of the tournament will be a single-elimination tournament of the top six teams in the league, as selected by the conference, with the top two seeds gaining first-round byes. The winner receives the BIG EAST’s automatic berth into the NCAA Championships, which begin at campus sights on May 11. The Irish have earned the No. 1 seed in six of their seven years in the conference (seeded No. 2 in 2000). Notre Dame has advanced to the final in each of the past six years to face Miami, winning titles in 1996 and 1999.
Play gets underway Friday morning with fourth-seeded Boston College and the fifth seed, Rutgers, playing at 9:00 a.m. In the other quarterfinal matchup, the No. 3 seed and host Hurricanes will face sixth-seeded West Virginia at Noon. The semifinals are set for Saturday with the Irish taking on the BC-Rutgers winner at 9:00 a.m. and second-seeded Virginia Tech facing the Miami-WVU winner at Noon. Friday’s losing teams will play at 3:00 p.m. on Saturday in consolation action. The championship and third-place matches are both slated for Sunday at Noon.
A season ago, the Irish defeated Rutgers 4-0 in the semifinals, but fell 4-2 to second-seeded Miami in the championship. The Hurricanes won the doubles point and three of five completed singles matches to win their second straight conference crown. Miami got wins at Nos. 1, 2 and 5 singles, while Aaron Talarico (Laguna Beach, Calif.) won at No. 4 and Matt Daly gained victory at No. 6 for Notre Dame. Tomas Smid clinched the win with a three-set victory at No. 2, while the match at No. 3 was in the midst of a third set.
Current Irish players were instrumental in winning Notre Dame’s last league title. In 1999, Miami won the doubles point and led 3-2 before the Irish rallied with wins by a pair of freshmen. Casey Smith (Leawood, Kan.) held on for a 4-6, 7-5, 7-5 win at No. 4 over Jose Lieberman. Up 5-4 in the second set, Lieberman served for the match, but Smith rallied to force a third set. The Irish freshman then fell behind 0-40 on his serve at 5-5 in the final set before winning nine straight points to win his match and even the team contest at 3-3. Javier Taborga (La Paz, Bolivia) then delivered a 6-2, 5-7, 7-5 win at No. 6 over Joel Berman to give the Irish their second BIG EAST title.
Eight Notre Dame players have past experience playing in the BIG EAST Championship. Most notably, Taborga is 3-1 in singles (one abandoned match) and 5-1 in doubles (two abandoned matches) and was involved in the title-clinching match in both 1999 and 2001, defeating Joel Berman at No. 6 three years ago and losing to Tomas Smid at No. 2 last season. Smith is 5-2 (one match abandoned) in singles and 4-2 in doubles (one match abandoned), while Talarico has won all five completed doubles matches (three abandoned) to go along with a 2-1 (2 abandoned) record in singles.
Notre Dame has candidates for the 2002 BIG EAST Most Outstanding Player and Coach of the Year awards. Taborga, ranked 14th, enters the tournament as the highest-ranked singles player in the conference, while he and Smith are the only doubles pair in the league in the national rankings, checking in at No. 5. Three-time All-American Ryan Sachire (’00) is the only Irish player to win the award, capturing it in 1999 and 2000. Notre Dame head coach Bob Bayliss is a two-time conference coach-of-the-year honoree, earning that distinction in 1998 and ’99. Bayliss’ Irish enter the tournament as the only BIG EAST team to be ranked in the national top 30.
Much success has come for Notre Dame against BIG EAST schools over the years. The Irish are 29-13 all-time against current members of the conference. The majority of Notre Dame defeats have come at the hands of Miami, which has won 10 of 16 contests, giving the Irish a sparkling 23-3 record against the rest of the league. Only Georgetown, Virginia Tech and West Virginia have defeated Notre Dame. In the Bayliss era, Notre Dame is 6-6 against Miami and 16-1 vs. the rest of the conference. In tournament play, the Irish have a 13-4 record and have registered shutout victories in all 11 non-championship matches (second round and semifinals) since joining the conference.
Regarding teams in this year’s field, Notre Dame lost its only meeting with Virginia Tech, a 7-2 decision in 1977. The Irish defeated Miami earlier this season to snap a four-match losing skid and improve to 6-10 in the series. Notre Dame has won all three meetings against Boston College and has also been successful in all four matchups with Rutgers, defeating the Scarlet Knights in the semifinals of the conference tournament in 1996, ’97, ’99 and 2001. The Irish have won six of seven meetings with West Virginia, losing in 1989, but winning the last five, including a win in the ’98 BIG EAST semifinals.
Prior to joining the BIG EAST, Notre Dame competed in the Midwestern Collegiate Conference in men’s tennis from 1989-95. The Irish won seven consecutive league titles and Bayliss was honored four times as the conference’s top coach. In MCC and BIG EAST play combined, the Irish have won nine conference championships in the past 13 years.
2002 BIG EAST CHAMPIONSHIP FIELD: Virginia Tech will be one of the contenders for this year’s title, earning the second seed in just its second year of BIG EAST competition. The Hokies were ranked 59th in the preseason, moved up to No. 30 last week and enter the weekend ranked 35th in the nation. Virginia Tech is 15-6 and has won 10 of its last 12 matches. The Hokies registered wins over Wake Forest (4-3) and VCU (4-1), two teams currently ranked in the top 25. Virginia Tech and Notre Dame have faced a trio of common opponents this spring: William & Mary, Ohio State and SMU. The Irish notched wins against all three, while the Hokies posted an 0-3 mark. In 2001, Virginia Tech finished third in the BIG EAST Championship, losing to Miami 4-1 in the semifinals. Saber Kadiri is the only ranked player for the Hokies, listed at No. 83 in singles. Kadiri is 27-14, mostly at No. 1, and was ranked 55th in the fall rankings after winning the singles title in the Omni Hotels Eastern Region Championships.
The third-seeded Hurricanes were listed 18th in the preseason, but are currently ranked 43rd after a 10-8 regular season. Miami lost 6-1 to Notre Dame in February in the Eck Tennis Pavilion. The Irish and ‘Canes have faced three common opponents, with Notre Dame defeating Wisconsin, SMU and Duke, while Miami beat the first two before falling 7-0 to the Blue Devils. The Hurricanes have hosted the BIG EAST Championship every year since 1993 and have six titles in that span, losing only in the final to the Irish in 1996 and 1999. Head coach Jay Berger earned conference coach-of-the-year honors in each of the last two seasons. Freshman Todd Widom enters the weekend ranked 22nd nationally in singles, though he has been ranked as high as No. 12 this year. He is 27-5 overall and was 13-1 in dual matches at one point with his only defeat coming to Javier Taborga (La Paz, Bolivia).
Boston College enters the BIG EAST Championship with the longest current winning streak, having won each of its last eight matches, dating back more than a month. The Eagles are 12-7 overall this spring and have won all six matches against league opponents. Last weekend, BC edged Rutgers 4-3 in its season finale, a preview of the Eagles-Scarlet Knights first-round matchup on Friday. Boston College finished sixth in the 2001 BIG EAST tournament, marking the program’s best result since 1995. The Eagles hold the record for most conference championships, winning 10 of the first 12 titles in BIG EAST history, including eight in a row from 1981-88.
Fifth-seeded Rutgers is 7-7 (4-1 BIG EAST) in 2002 with the loss to the Eagles the only blemish in its final six regular-season matches. The Scarlet Knights finished fourth last season after losing to Notre Dame in the semifinals and have posted top-five finishes in the conference tournament every season since joining the BIG EAST in 1996.
West Virginia is 8-9 (3-1 BIG EAST) this season, but enters the BIG EAST tournament on a four-match winning streak, including victories over Georgetown and Connecticut last weekend to secure a berth in the field as the No. 6 seed. The Mountaineers return to the conference tournament after not qualifying a season ago. West Virginia finished fourth in 2000, matching the best result in school history.
BIG EAST’S BEST: The University of Notre Dame is threatening the conference record for BIG EAST championships in an academic year. The Irish already have captured league titles in five sports this season — men’s cross country, women’s soccer, volleyball, women’s swimming and diving, and women’s indoor track and field. The BIG EAST record for championships in a season is six, set by Notre Dame in 1996-97, when Irish teams captured crowns in men’s soccer, women’s soccer, volleyball, women’s swimming and diving, men’s golf, and women’s tennis. The Irish have three opportunities to add to this season’s total this weekend, with the men’s and women’s tennis championships in Coral Gables, Fla., as well as the BIG EAST men’s golf championship, which is slated for this Saturday and Sunday at the Warren Golf Course in Notre Dame, Ind. The Irish are the third seed for that championship, while both tennis teams are seeded first.
THE WINNING WAY: Notre Dame defeated Ball State last weekend to finish the regular season with a 19-6 record, marking the most for an Irish team entering the postseason since 1994. That squad was 21-9 in the regular season before advancing to the round of 16 in the NCAA tournament — the last time Notre Dame advanced that far in the NCAAs.
REMARKABLE RANKINGS: The Irish have had a number of notable rankings this season in both the team and individual Omni Hotels Collegiate Tennis Rankings. On two occasions this year, Notre Dame was ranked fourth in the team rankings — the second-highest ranking in school history. The only time the Irish were ranked higher was in the final poll of the 1992 season, when Notre Dame was No. 3 after losing in the NCAA final. The Irish, currently 10th, have been ranked in the national top 10 in each poll this season. Notre Dame has never been in the top 10 in each set of rankings throughout a season.
Senior Javier Taborga (La Paz, Bolivia) has been ranked as high as 11th in the national singles rankings, marking the highest listing by an Irish singles player since Ryan Sachire finished the 2000 season ranked 11th. Taborga is just the third player in school history to be ranked as high as No. 11 nationally in singles. Sachire was ranked as high as No. 2 in the nation and David DiLucia (’92) is the only Notre Dame player to be ranked No. 1 in the nation in singles.
Taborga and classmate Casey Smith (Leawood, Kan.), who were fourth in the national doubles rankings earlier this season, are just the second doubles team in school history to be ranked as high as No. 4, a spot they occupied as recently as last week. DiLucia and Chuck Coleman, who earned doubles All-America honors in 1991 and 1992, were ranked No. 1 in the nation for a time.
TOUGH SLATE: The road to the postseason has been a challenging one for Notre Dame this year. Of the 25 dual-match opponents for the Irish this spring, 22 were ranked in the national top 75 at the time of the match. Notre Dame was 16-6 against ranked teams in 2002. Of the opponents on the ’02 slate, 14 are currently ranked in the national top 40 and eight are in the top 25. In addition, Notre Dame played five matches against teams currently in the national top six (#1 Georgia, #5 Missisippi, #6 Pepperdine and two against #3 Illinois) and The Irish faced 17 teams that advanced to the NCAA tournament a season ago, including six round-of-16 participants and half of the teams who advanced to the final four (SMU and national champion Georgia).
IRISH HEAD COACH: Bob Bayliss is in his 15th year at Notre Dame with a 280-127 (.688) record and his 33rd year as a collegiate coach with a 562-221 mark. His .718 winning percentage is fourth among active coaches and seventh on the all-time NCAA list. Bayliss was named ITA National Coach of the Year in 1992 after leading the Irish to the national title match. Bayliss is also a four-time Region IV coach of the year (including 2001) and has been honored as conference coach of the year six times (two BIG EAST, four Midwestern Collegiate Conference). He is second among all-time Irish coaches in wins, trailing only Hall-of-Famer Tom Fallon’s 511. Bayliss began his coaching career at Navy, where he coached for 11 years, and then coached at MIT for three years before coming to Notre Dame in 1988. Earlier this year, Bayliss was inducted into the University of Richmond Athletics Hall of Fame. Bayliss, who earned a bachelor’s degree in 1966 and a master’s degree in 1971 from the university, played No. 2 singles and No. 1 doubles as a senior on the Spider tennis team.
TABORGA TERIFICO: After never playing higher than No. 2 singles prior to this season, senior Javier Taborga (La Paz, Bolivia) has turned into one of the top singles players in the nation in 2002. He has posted a 17-4 record at No. 1 and is 26-10 overall, including eight wins over players currently ranked in the top 35 in the nation. Taborga is 19-5 this spring and overall has registered a total of 12 wins over players currently ranked. Highlights of his play include wins over defending NCAA singles and doubles champion #4 Matias Boeker of Georgia (No. 1 in preseason singles rankings), #12 Amer Delic of Illinois (twice in 11 days), #22 Todd Widom of Miami, #25 Alex Hartman of Mississippi, #32 Danny Westerman of Wisconsin, #33 Jeremy Wurtzman of Ohio State, #35 Krystian Pfeiffer of SMU and #45 Michael Yani. Taborga has lost just six times in his last 29 matches, dating back to October, and all of those defeats have come to players currently in the national rankings (#1 Harsh Mankad of Minnesota, #5 Al Garland of Pepperdine, #7 Jesse Witten, #61 Henry Beam of Michigan, #75 Milan Rakvica of Indiana and #89 Aleksey Zharinov of Minnesota). He was named the Most Outstanding Player at the Blue-Gray National Classic after winning all four of his matches, including an upset of ninth-ranked Delic and a win over Harvard’s David Lingman in the last match on-court to earn the Irish a spot in the championship match. At last year’s ITA All-American Championships, Taborga defeated Stanford’s K.J. Hippensteel, currently ranked third in the nation, denying Hippensteel of the title he won in both 1999 and 2001. Out of Taborga’s 10 losses, seven were to players currently ranked in the top 90 and three were decided in match tiebreakers. He advanced to the quarterfinals in last fall’s Region IV Championships before falling to Mankad, the current No. 1 player in the nation. Taborga is 21-0 when winning the first set this season and 8-0 in three-set matches. In 2001, he was 23-12 playing No. 2 singles and was 5-3 against ranked players.
FRIENDS IN LOW PLACES: Three Irish players have been dominant playing in the bottom part of the singles lineup this spring. Sophomore Luis Haddock-Morales (Caguas, Puerto Rico) is 27-6 overall this season and 18-5 in dual-match action, playing mostly at No. 4. He has won 11 of his last 13 matches. Classmate Matthew Scott (Paris, France) leads the team in victories with a 29-4 mark, including a sparkling 21-2 record this spring, playing mostly No. 5. Scott, listed 85th in the latest national singles rankings, will look to register the 18th 30-win season for a singles player in the Bayliss era. His 21 dual-match victories are tied for ninth on the Bayliss-tenure list of singles dual-match wins in a season. In his career, Scott is 46-9 in singles. Senior Andrew Laflin (Tampa, Fla.) is 20-1 in 2001-02, including 14-1 this spring, playing mostly at No. 6. He has won 34 of his last 37 singles tilts.
DOUBLES ALL-AMERICA CANDIDATES: The No. 1 doubles team of seniors Casey Smith (Leawood, Kan.) and Javier Taborga (La Paz, Bolivia) are in the midst of one of the most successful seasons of doubles in school history and are candidates to become just the fourth Irish doubles pair to earn All-America honors. Smith and Taborga are 29-11 and ranked fifth in the nation. Their victory total marks the highest by a doubles team in a season in the Bob Bayliss era (1988-present), while Smith’s 30 partnered victories this season (29 with Taborga and one with Ashok Raju) are the most by an individual in that span. The pair is 14-7 in dual-match action and has defeated 10 ranked teams. The Irish have eight wins over top-30 teams, as well as three over teams currently listed in the national top five (#1 Matkowski/Rojer of UCLA, two against #4 Calkins/Delic of Illinois). Smith and Taborga are just the second doubles team in school history to be ranked as high as No. 4 in the nation, a spot they occupied as recently as last week. David DiLucia and Chuck Coleman, who earned doubles All-America honors in 1991 and 1992, were ranked No. 1 in the nation for a time. Taborga (74-44) and Smith (74-50) are tied with each other for fifth on the list of career doubles wins in the Bayliss era. Taborga needs one more doubles victory to become just the fourth player in the Bayliss era to register 75 career wins in both singles and doubles. He is 75-38 in singles and 74-44 in doubles and would join Andy Zurcher (’94), Ryan Simme (’97) and Brian Patterson (’99) in that distinction.
This year’s Irish pair had a strong fall season that vaulted them from their No. 34 preseason ranking into the national top 10, where they have remained all spring. Smith and Taborga advanced through qualifying and posted a 6-1 mark (losing only to top-seeded Lipsky/Martin of Stanford) at the ITA All-American Championships en route to capturing the consolation title. The Irish team reached the semifinals in the Omni Hotels Region IV Championships, which helped them earn an at-large bid to the National Indoor Championships. In that tournament, Smith and Taborga defeated the current national No. 1, UCLA’s Matkowski/Rojer, on their way to losing in a tiebreaker in the semifinals.
DOUBLES DYNAMICS: Notre Dame has used a multitude of different doubles teams this season and Bob Bayliss has experimented with his doubles lineup as recently as this week. Fifteen different pairs have been used this spring, including eight different teams at No. 3. Bayliss was faced with a difficult decision this week, as he was forced to pare down his starting singles and doubles lineup to the BIG EAST and NCAA maximum of eight players, after nine have played in the lineup most of the season. In all likelihood, one of the three players who have played only doubles this spring will be forced to sit out of the postseason matches. Senior Ashok Raju (Morgantown, W. Va.) has posted an 11-10 doubles mark this spring, while classmate James Malhame (Douglaston, N.Y.) is 10-11 and freshman Brent D’Amico (Centennial, Colo.) stands at 11-6 entering postseason play. Notre Dame has won the doubles point 14 times in 25 matches this spring (it was not played in the SMU match).
FINISH WHAT YA STARTED: The top seven singles players for the Irish have been very successful when winning the first set this season. They have combined for a 129-8 (.935) record in 2001-02 when taking the opening set. Particularly successful have been Luis Haddock-Morales (23-0, 38-0 career), Andrew Laflin (18-0, 33 in a row), Matthew Scott (26-1), Javier Taborga (21-0) and Aaron Talarico (16-1).
TAKE IT TO THE LIMIT: Notre Dame players have been successful in third sets this season, with the top six players posting a combined 31-11 (.738) mark in three-setters. Over the past six matches, Irish players have posted a 9-2 record in three-set matches. Against Indiana State and SMU, there were three tilts decided in three sets and the Irish won all of them in both cases. Senior Javier Taborga (La Paz, Bolivia) has been particularly dominant, winning all eight of his three-set affairs this season.
GOING DEEP: The lower half of the singles lineup has been a strength for Notre Dame over the past two seasons. Last year, the Nos. 4, 5 and 6 spots compiled a combined 53-11 (.828) record in dual matches. In 2002, the bottom half of the singles lineup is 54-16 (.771), making the spots a combined 107-27 (.798) over the past two seasons. The No. 4 singles position, in particular, has been a strength of the Irish. Last year, Notre Dame players compiled a 21-2 record in that slot and all three competitors responsible for that mark returned to the fold in 2002. This season, Irish players are 20-4 at No. 4, making Notre Dame a combined 41-6 (.872) at the position over the past two seasons.
IRISH INK FIVE: Bob Bayliss recently announced the signing of five incoming freshman for the 2002-03 school year. Patrick Buchanan (Fullerton, Calif.), Shannon Buck (New Braunfels, Texas), Eric Langenkamp (Scarsdale, N.Y.), Sergey Leonyuk (Boca Raton, Fla.) and Steve Roszak (Shawnee Mission, Kan.) have signed national letters of intent to enroll at Notre Dame next year and join the Irish tennis team in the fall. Buchanan is ranked 43rd nationally among players 18 and under and is ranked 20th among high school seniors in the U.S. Buck was ranked fifth in the 16-and-under division last year and is 32nd in the 18s, ranking 13th among seniors. Langenkamp is 67th in the 18s and is the top-ranked high school senior in the Eastern section of the United States Tennis Association and is 33rd among all Americans entering college next year. Leonyuk is a native of Russia who has done well in International Tennis Federation junior tournaments and Bayliss expects him to play at the level of a top 10-to-20 junior in the U.S. Roszak was ranked 44th in the 16s last year and recently won a designated sectional tournament in the MUTA.
KEEPING UP WITH NOTRE DAME TENNIS: For the fastest results of Notre Dame tennis matches, call the Notre Dame sports information hotline at (574) 631-3000 and choose #8. The hotline provides schedule and results information for varsity sports and serves as a supplement to the game recaps and weekly releases provided on the official athletic website at www.und.com. The hotline is the first medium updated with the results of each Notre Dame tennis match. In addition, media members may be added to the sports information e-mail release list by contacting Bo Rottenborn at Rottenborn.2@nd.edu, or Chris Masters at masters.5@nd.edu.
GETTING YOUR TIMING DOWN: Just a reminder that South Bend never changes its clocks, remaining on Eastern Standard Time throughout the year. From now through the end of October, Notre Dame basically will be on Central time, since Eastern Standard Time is the equivalent of Central Daylight Time. When most of the rest of the country returns to Standard time the last Saturday in October, Notre Dame then will match Eastern time.