April 17, 2002

Jesse Witten, a freshman on the University of Kentucky men’s tennis team, received the third-ever Southeastern Conference Freshman of the Year Award on Wednesday, April 17, at the SEC Tournament banquet. The banquet is held every year before the beginning of the SEC Championship Tournament.

“This is a great achievement for Jesse,” Coach Dennis Emery said. “He has worked so hard throughout the season and its great to see him get this type of recognition.”

Witten, ranked seventh in the nation, held the top spot in Kentucky’s singles line-up all season and finished the regular season with a 16-6 overall record. The Naples, Fla., native is 6-5 in SEC play this season. Witten also was named to the first-team All-SEC, while teammate Karim Benmansour earned second-team honors.

“I was surprised,” Witten said. ” With so many great players in this conference, it is an honor to be considered the top freshman. A lot of my success is because of coach and especially the other guys on the team. I could not have accomplished as much as I did without them backing me up.”

The opening round of the championships begins on Thursday, April 18, with the first match beginning at 8 a.m. Kentucky, the tournament’s seventh seed, will face the 10th-seeded Mississippi State Bulldogs at 11 a.m. The Cats and the Bulldogs met earlier this season in Lexington, Ky., on March 24. Mississippi State walked away with a 4-3 victory over the Cats.

The tournament concludes on Sunday, April 21 with the championship match at 2 p.m. at the Varsity Courts on the University of Tennessee campus.

Tournament Seeds
()= national ranking
1.Univ. of Georgia (1)
2.Univ. of Mississippi (5)
3.Auburn University (15)
4.Univ. of Tennessee (11)
5.Univ. of Florida (8)
6.Univ. of Alabama (16)
7.Univ. of Kentucky (9)
8.Univ. of Arkansas (22)
9.Univ. of South Carolina (21)
10.Mississippi State Univ. (29)
11.Louisiana State Univ. (38)
12.Vanderbilt Univ. (45)

SEC Awards
Coach of the Year – Andy Jackson (Florida)
Player of the Year – Matias Boeker (Georgia)
Freshman of the Year – Jesse Witten (Kentucky)