Men's tennis team in high spirits after strong spring start

by Steven Fernandez

Daily Lobo

The UNM men's tennis team dusted off its rackets this weekend by opening spring play at the Purdue Boilermaker

Invitational.

The tournament, which was held in West Lafayette, Ind., was not a team-scoring event, but the Lobos still had positive results.

UNM competed against Purdue on Saturday and won four of the seven matches.

The Lobos also took four of the seven matches against West Virginia and won all seven matches against Kentucky on Monday.

UNM head coach Alan Dils said he was happy with his team's performance over the weekend.

"We did what we wanted to do, which was get a lot of good matches at the beginning of the season against some good teams," he said. "I thought we did well. We won every match (Monday)."

UNM junior Max Jones, who is ranked No. 73 in the country, started off the 2007 season in impressive form.

He defeated Purdue's Paul Rose 7-6, 7-6 on Saturday. He also took down Kentucky's Marcus Smith on Monday in two sets, winning 6-3, 6-2.

However, Jones' most impressive victory came Sunday against Western Michigan's Brady Crosby, who is ranked No. 52 in the nation. Jones won again in two sets, upsetting Crosby 6-4, 6-4.

Dils said he was happy with Jones' accomplishment as well as the team's overall play.

"That's good for Max," Dils said. "That's good for all the guys. Every day, we play better than we did the day before. I thought we did pretty well at getting better and better. We played our best tennis of the whole tournament (on Monday)."

Jones and junior doubles teammate Kamil Pajkowski won two of their three matches over the weekend. The Lobos' top doubles team's only loss came against Western Michigan's Crosby and Tim Bradshaw, who are the No. 21-ranked doubles team in the country.

Dils said he was enthusiastic with Jones and Pajkowski's doubles play, even in the 8-6 loss to Western Michigan.

"They're playing solid and doing a good job," he said. "They won two out of three doubles matches and had a chance to win the other one."

UNM's No. 2 doubles team of sophomores Johnny Parkes and Miles Bugby also won two of their three matches.

Dils said that along with Jones and Pajkowski, Parkes and Bugby are a team that plays well

together.

"I give them both a lot of credit," Dils said. "They're both playing really good and putting themselves in the right position."

Dils said he expects Parkes and sophomore Graeme Kassautzki to step up and have solid seasons for the Lobos this year.

"Those guys have a chance to have a really good breakout year, both of them," he said.

The men's tennis team will travel to Boise, Idaho, on Saturday to compete in the Mountain Region Indoor Playoff.

Dils said he is looking forward to the trip, especially after the success the Lobos had this weekend.

"I still don't think we've played our best tennis," he said. "But we're certainly playing better now that we've gone through this tournament."