The ninth-ranked Baylor men’s tennis team will play two matches over the next three days in California. First, the Bears will take on UC Santa Barbara at 3:30 p.m. CT Thursday, before playing at No. 13 UCLA Saturday at 5:30 p.m.
The Bears are 12-2 on the season after beating No. 40 USF, 4-3, Monday in Bradenton, Fla. BU has played just one true road match in 2017, defeating Texas A&M, 4-3, in College Station, Texas, on Jan. 28.
Baylor has a trio of ranked players on the singles side. Sophomore Juan Benitez is ranked No. 15 in the country and owns a dual-match record of 9-2 in singles play, while senior Max Tchoutakian is ranked No. 35 with a 7-0 dual-match mark and sophomore Johannes Schretter sits at No. 81, after starting the year at 9-1. The Bears boast one ranked doubles tandem as Will Little and Schretter team together to be No. 57.
UC Santa Barbara is led by the seventh-ranked doubles duo of Simon Freund and Morgan Mays. UCSB is 6-3 on the year and 1-1 at home in 2017. The Ganchos lost in their last match out, a 4-3 defeat to Oregon Sunday. The Bears have never beaten UCSB, holding a 0-3 record in the all-time series. However, the last meeting between the two schools was in 1998 with UC Santa Barbara earning a 4-2 victory.
UCLA is 8-3 on the season and 5-0 at home in 2017. The Bruins last played a dual-match on Feb. 25, a 4-2 win over Stanford, but they will travel to play at USC on Thursday prior to the match against BU. The Bruins have a pair of ranked singles players in No. 11 Gage Brymer and No. 42 Martin Redlicki. Redlicki partners with Evan Zhu to give UCLA a ranked doubles tandem at No. 26. Baylor is 9-5 against UCLA all-time, including two-straight victories over the Bruins. In their last meeting, BU recorded a 4-0 sweep at the Hawkins Indoor Tennis Center on Feb. 22, 2015.
Following the match at UCLA, the Bears will return to Waco, but then head back to California to participate in the BNP Paribas Collegiate Challenge presented by Oracle. That event will include three matches, one each day, on March 17-19.
