The rain of the last few days has prevented the No. 1 UCLA
men’s tennis team (6-0) from taking the courts and hitting
some balls.
Instead, they’ve been relegated to running and
waiting.
“When you take two or three days off, I don’t like
that,” head coach Billy Martin said. “We haven’t
had the best preparation for (the matches).”
Not that it should really matter.
Arizona State, UCLA’s opponent in today’s match at
the Los Angeles Tennis Center, is 3-2, but the Sun Devils are 1-53
against the Bruins since 1967.
“Arizona State doesn’t look quite as strong as they
have in years past, but we certainly don’t want to
underestimate them,” Martin said.
Arizona visits Westwoodo on Saturday at noon, and the Wildcats
look like they might provide UCLA with some stiffer
competition.
Although they have never beaten the Bruins, Arizona has won two
in a row and has exceeded expectations thus far this season.
“Arizona looks like they’re a little better than I
anticipated,” Martin said, “They’ve had a couple
good wins, so I think we’ve got to be conscious of making
sure we’re ready for them.”
The Wildcats are coming off of victories over UCSB, 7-0, and
Utah, 6-1; however, they haven’t beaten the Bruins in the
teams’ last 50 meetings.
“I really expect us to win, pretty convincingly,”
said junior Tobias Clemens, the No. 12 singles player in the
nation. “Everybody should be peaking now, so I expect us to
play really well and beat the Arizona schools.”