I know I say this every year. But this really is the men’s
tennis team’s best chance to win the NCAA Championship.
I know, this is the fourth year in a row that I’m saying
that, but I feel more strongly about it this year than ever
before.
You can fill in the punch line here about the team being cursed,
coach Billy Martin not being able to win a title, a bird dying or
some underdog playing an epic five-hour match to beat this team.
But just because UCLA, a perennial top five team, hasn’t won
a national title since 1984 doesn’t mean the Bruins
can’t win it this year. Just because something weird seems to
happen to this team every year doesn’t mean it will this
year.
This year’s team has four seniors, and in most sports,
it’s the seniors who lead the teams to national titles.
It’s the seniors who play with the greatest sense of
urgency.
And the Bruins’ non-seniors are reliable as well. Philipp
Gruendler, the team’s No. 6 starter, hasn’t played as
well as he would’ve liked this season, but he still wins a
lot. He was a star in the NCAA Tournament a year ago, not losing
any of his singles matches.
Meanwhile, Benjamin Kohlloeffel was competitive for much of the
season at the No. 1 spot. He’s playing No. 2 at the
tournament and you’d be hard-pressed to find a better player
at that spot anywhere in the country.
Yet when it comes down to it, the fate of this team will rest on
the seniors. The group has come up with clutch wins, including last
year’s semifinal win over a then-unbeaten Illinois squad that
had won 53 consecutive matches. But that win drained the team for
the next day when it got shut out in the finals by Baylor.
This year, the Bruins have slipped to the seventh seed while
Baylor has won 54 matches in a row and is the top seed. But never
underestimate the power of revenge. The Bruins have already avenged
one of their three losses this year by beating Cal this past Sunday
in Regionals. And it’s very likely they’ll have a
chance to redeem their first loss of the season against Virginia in
the quarterfinals. The ultimate grudge match would come in the
finals though, where UCLA would again face a Baylor team just as
good as the one which shut out the Bruins last year.
So what would make this year any different? First, this
year’s team cares about doubles. Unlike the juggling of last
year, this year Martin’s doubles teams have remained fairly
consistent and have been more successful than past Bruin teams,
where doubles was a liability. Had UCLA been able to pull off the
doubles point in the finals a year ago, it would have energized
them for singles and kept the match competitive.
But in the end, it will boil down to the four seniors. Last
chances tend to be the best chances. They’ve been knocking on
the door for way too long for it not to finally open.
Quiñonez is predicting that women’s tennis will
beat USC tonight. It worked last time. E-mail him at
gquinonez@media.ucla.edu.