UCLA looks for victory over Kentucky

  CLAIRE ZUGMEYER Sophomore Tobias Clemens
sends a backhand back at his USC opponent.

By Greg Schain
Daily Bruin Reporter

The UCLA men’s tennis team travels from the big city to
the countryside of Kentucky this week to take on one of college
tennis’ best programs.

Starting Thursday, No. 3 UCLA (4-0, 1-0 Pac-10) will participate
in the National Indoor Championships, which is one of the most
prestigious early season tournaments on the college circuit.

So as a tune-up, the Bruins will play No. 23 Kentucky (3-0) at
Hilary J. Boone Tennis Complex, the same facility that the National
Indoors will be held at later in the week.

“We came to Kentucky early to get a match under our belt
in this stadium before the tournament starts,” UCLA head
coach Billy Martin said.

The Bruins are coming off one of the most impressive wins in
college tennis this season, crushing No. 12 USC 7-0 at the Los
Angeles Tennis Center and only giving up one set in the entire
match.

“It’s intimidating to play UCLA after seeing what
they did to Southern Cal,” Kentucky head coach Dennis Emery
said. “We feel like right now, UCLA is the best team in the
country and they are coming off what is clearly the best win by
anybody this season.”

Since 1967, UCLA has won four of five matches against Kentucky,
including a 7-0 victory at the LATC in March of 2001.

“We love to play teams like UCLA because it gets us ready
for our conference schedule,” Emery said. “We had a
great match last year and we should have another one
(today).”

Kentucky is in the SEC, one of the toughest collegiate tennis
conferences in the nation.

This will be UCLA’s first match indoors this season, but
the Bruins aren’t too worried about the change in conditions.
They have won the National Indoors the last three seasons, and feel
more than comfortable playing in the confined space.

“It won’t be a disadvantage playing indoors,”
Martin said. “We have a few players who it suits
well.”

The team that wins the National Indoors will claim college
tennis’ No. 1 ranking, which will help them with seeding for
the NCAA Tournament in May.