Lobos Face No. 5 Stanford to Open NCAA Tournament

ALBUQUERQUE, N.M. — The University of New Mexico makes its return into the NCAA Tournament with a 2 p.m. Mountain Time match with the tournament’s No. 4 seed, the Stanford Cardinal, which is ranked No. 5 in the last ITA Tennis rankings, with UNM sitting at No. 62.  The Lobos are winners of 12 of the last 15 matches, and they will be taking on a team that is looking for its first national title since the 2000 season, ending a stretch of nine NCAA Championships in a 13-year period.

New Mexico will enter the match on quite the roll, and that roll is even better when you look at the last 15 matches, knowing of the three they lost, all were 4-3, and two of the three were without top player Aram Noroozian, who missed a weekend at Air Force and Denver.  New Mexico rolled through the league in the Credit Union 1 Mountain West Tournament, taking out host No. 7 UNLV 4-1 before defeating No. 3 Utah State in the semifinals 4-2.  In the championship match, UNM took on top-seed and No. 42-ranked Boise State, who entered with a 13-match winning streak and were going for a third straight Mountain West Tournament title.  The Lobos not only won the title, but did it convincingly 4-0 to win the tournament for the first time in 16 years.

Stanford enters the match with a 22-5 record and it won the ACC Tournament winning all three matches over ranked opponents.  After ending the season with a 4-2 win over No. 9 California, the Cardinal beat in order; No. 17 Florida State 4-3, No. 19 Dule 4-2 and No. 6 Virginia 4-2.  Stanford has three players nationally ranked in singles led by No. 7 Samir Banerjee, who is 13-7 on the season.  All three of Stanford’s doubles teams are also nationally-ranked.

Below is the probable matchups for the FIrst Round match on Friday at 2 p.m. Mountain Time.

DOUBLES

No. 1 – Aram Noroozian and Georgio Samaha (most likely vs. No. 70 Nicolas Godsick and Hudson Rivera)

The Lobo duo has been terrific all season and they are 21-7 as a duo, 15-4 at No. 1 doubles.  The pair has gone 11-2 in its last 13 decisions, and they have wins over the No. 3 and No. 77 doubles teams already this season.  Godsick and Rivera have just eight decisions on the season but they are 6-2 and have the most decisions at No. 1 for Stanford.  Their top win was in their most recent match, a 6-3 win over Virginia’s 30th-ranked doubles team.

No. 2 – Nicolas Recoura and Daniil Kakhniuk (most likely vs. No. 47 Kyle Kang and Henry von der Schulenburg)

UNM’s pairing of Recoura and Kakhniuk had a six-match win streak snapped in their last outing against Boise State, but the duo is a solid 16-9 overall and 10-4 at No. 2 doubles.  They have played exclusively together since February 22 and they were even or had leads in three of the four unfinished matches while going 10-3 over that time frame.  Kang and von der Schulenburg have only played as a duo over the last month, going 4-2, going 2-2 against nationally-ranked foes.

No. 3 – Aditya Balsekar and Avery Tallakson (most likely vs. No. 48 Samir Banerjee and Alexander Razeghi)

UNM’s duo of Balsekar and Tallakson have lost just one time in the last 15 matches, going 9-1 and have four matches halted with victory eminent. The only loss in that time frame with a match where they moved up to No. 2 and lost in a tiebreaker, so this pairing might be UNM’s hottest entering the NCAAs.  They should face Samir Banerjee and Alex Razeghi, who are the highest ranked duo for Stanford, yet playing at No. 3.  The pair of 5-5, but after not playing together for a month, they were reunited at the ACC Tournament, losing twice.

No. 1 – Aram Noroozian (most likely vs. No. 7 Samir Banerjee)

Noroozian was a contender for Mountain West Player of the Year, but was hurt by three unfinished matches where he was leading. Overall, Noroozian is 21-9 and 12-5 at No. 1 singles. He had a two-month stretch from February 15 to April 17 where he went 9-0 with five unfinished matches before losing back-to-back matches, both in straight sets but with three of the sets in tiebreakers.  He rebounded from a double tiebreak loss in the regular season finale to No. 120 Jett Middleton to sweep him (after he dropped one slot to No. 121), winning 6-2, 6-4, setting up UNM’s final run to the title.  Banerjee had a terrific early season run in the ITA All-American Championships, advancing to the quarterfinals, and he lost in his opening round of the NCAA Singles Championship to No. 1 Ozan Baris of Michigan State in a tough draw, but he has a 13-7 overall record despite playing 15 nationally-ranked opponents (going 10-5), including a win over No. 1 Michael Zheng of Columbia in straight sets.

No. 2 – Aditya Balsekar (most likely vs. Kyle Kang)

Balsekar didn’t play in the fall, going 9-12 in the spring season, playing anywhere from one to four, but going 6-7 at No. 2.  It was he who ended a weird UNM stretch where the Lobos went 0-9 to start the season at No. 2, but he has consistently picked up key wins in matches, going 5-5 over the back-half of the season, with two of those losses when he moved into the No. 1 slot. Kang is 9-8 this season but he will enter the tournament on a three-match skid, losing to three ranked opponents, two in the ACC Tournament and once in the regular season finale.

No. 3 – Dario Ciobotaru (most likely vs. No. 101 Max Basing)

Ciobotaru more than anyone can be traced as the catalyst for UNM’s successful back-half of the season, as he went 9-3 to bounce back after a rough 4-9 patch in the front half.  He has played his best tennis of late, including a win over No. 125 Rafa Papajcik of Denver.  His 6-3, 6-3 win over BSU’s Lukas Velik avenged a straight set loss just six days earlier and set up UNM with a 3-0 lead in the MW Finals.  Basing has been a hard out, winning seven of his last eight and nine straight against unranked opponents.  He went 3-0 in the ACC Tournament and his last loss to an unranked opponent was all the way back on November 7.

No. 4 – Georgio Samaha (most likely vs. No. 73 Henry von der Schulenburg)

A matchup of the two winningest players on each team in terms of career victories as Samaha has 83, all at UNM, and von der Schulenburg has 87 between Harvard and Stanford (also, his two schools have been Harvard and Stanford).  Samaha is 19-17 and with a win would become UNM’s fifth 20-match winner in singles, and he is tied for eighth on the all-time UNM singles wins list.  After a midseason stall in which he went just 1-12, Samaha turned it around and has gone 9-1 since.  That turnaround for him started with a wild three-set win over Santa Clara’s Luca Bluett in which all three sets were decided in tiebreakers.  Von der Schulenburg has been terrific, winning 12 straight since a Valentine’s Day loss in straight sets.  Over his current 12-match winning streak, he has lost one set, back on March 23.

No. 5 – Daniil Kakhniuk (most likely vs. Alex Razeghi)

Kakhniuk is UNM’s feel-good story for certain after injuries seemingly derailed his career, knocking him out of two separate seasons.  Returning to UNM after the coaching switch, he flourished going 21-14 overall and settling in at No. 5 singles, going 7-2 there. He played a lot of unfinished matches (five of his last 10) but he is 9-2 over his last 16 matches and he is terrific in tiebreakers, going 11-5 overall in them, the 16 easily the most on the team.  Razeghi is a freshman so this is his first NCAA Tournament foray, but he has been solid, going 15-4 overall, and he moved up into the No. 5 spot for the ACC Tournament, going 2-1.  He has played as high as No. 3 this season for Stanford.

No. 6 – Avery Tallakson (most likely vs. Hudson Rivera)

Tallakson has been the silent assassin for UNM, winning a team-best 25 matches after winning just nine in limited action last season.  Tallakson was named Mountain West Tournament MVP, doing so by clinching both the semifinal against Utah State and the final against Boise State.  In that Utah State win, a 7-6 (7-4), 4-6, 6-4 win, Tallakson trailed in the opening set 5-0, getting broken three times, and then facing set point twice against serve.  Somehow, he fought those off and basically went off, winning 20 of the next 24 points to tie and take the lead, eventually winning in a tiebreaker. He was won 16 of the last 17, the only loss coming in a third set tiebreaker.  Rivera is 9-5 on the season and has won five straight after a four-match losing streak where he played both five and two.