After breezing through its first match against Northern Arizona University 7-0, the UNM men's tennis team faces some stiff competition this weekend at the Region VII Indoor Championships at Boise, Idaho.
The Lobos, San Diego State University, Brigham Young University and host Boise State University are competing in the tournament, which has the top four teams in the region vying for a spot in the national Team Indoor Championships. UNM is the third seed and will face second-seeded San Diego State in the first semifinal Friday at 11 a.m. BYU and the top-seeded Broncos face off in the other match at 4 p.m.
The winners will play for the championship and a spot in the national tournament at 2 p.m. on Saturday.
UNM head coach Alan Dils said the stakes are high at this event because the winner will face off against the top 16 teams in the country at the national event.
"It's a great tournament to see where we are, but the potential is extremely high," Dils said.
The Lobos are coming off an impressive victory over the Lumberjacks on Sunday, as the team lost only one set in sweeping the match. Newcomers sophomore Divan Coetzee and freshman David Kowalski led the team in the top two spots.
Get content from The Daily Lobo delivered to your inbox
They both swept their matches, Coetzee by a 6-2, 6-4 score over Adrian Venturi and Kowalski beat Daniel Lundstrom 6-0, 6-1. Kowalski and Bart Scott teamed up at the number one doubles spot for an 8-4 win over Venturi and Jeff Johnson. Kowalski's performance was so dominating that he earned the Mountain West Conference's Player of the Week honor, the first for the team this season and the first for Kowalski.
"We did what I thought we should do," Dils said. "I thought we did a good job leading into the match preparing, and I think it showed. I think some guys played very, very well, and we just never really let them into the match."
The Lobos will get an early look at Mountain West nemesis San Diego State, which won the conference's regular season title last year over the Lobos. The teams tied for the best record at 4-2, but the Aztecs clinched the season title by virtue of its 4-3 win against UNM. The Lobos would turn the tables on SDSU in the conference tournament, taking a 4-2 win in the third-place match.
Junior Oliver Maiberger is the Aztecs' leading player, climbing to a No. 11 ranking in the nation in the preseason polls. He was upset in the first round of the National Indoor Singles Championship in the fall, but he paired up with teammate Ryan Redondo to capture the National Indoor Double Tennis Championship.
Gillaume Bouvier and Marcus Bernston gave the Broncos a tough one-two punch at the top of the order. Bouvier is ranked 71st in the nation and Bernston is 94th. Coetzee lost 6-1, 6-0 to Bouvier in the semifinals of the Omni Hotel Regional Championships in October at Las Vegas.
BYU is ranked 69th and its doubles team of Carlos Lozano and Gert Vilns is ranked 10th nationally. Coetzee upset Lozano in singles competition at the Omni last year, beating the 83rd-ranked player in three sets, 3-6, 6-2, 6-3.
Dils said the team will face some challenges this weekend, adding that it will play some tight, tough matches that ought to test the team's mettle.
"Here, we were able to get out into the lead and we just had to work hard to maintain it," Dils said. "There, we're probably going to have tight matches and tight sets, and you're going to be coming down to those two or three crucial points and you're going to have to be the one to win it. It's slightly different tennis than what we had to deal with."
