Oct. 24, 2011
LEXINGTON, Ky. – University of Kentucky men’s tennis senior Alex Musialek, who is ranked No. 20 in the nation in singles by the Intercollegiate Tennis Association, defeated fellow UK teammate No. 3 Eric Quigley on Monday to claim the singles title at the United States Tennis Association/ITA Ohio Valley Regional Indoor Championships in Knoxville, Tenn.
Musialek, who was the No. 2 seed in the event, took control of the finals match early against Quigley, who was the No. 1 seed. Musialek won the first set 6-3 and then grabbed an early break in the second set to post the 6-3, 6-3 win and claim the singles title.
“The singles final was a little bit of a tough match to watch because you have two guys, who are best friends and have done such a great job for our program the past four years, playing against each other,” UK associate head coach Cedric Kauffmann said. “We aren’t going to go over that match too much, but I think that Alex just played a little bit better today. They both had a great tournament and it is a tough thing to see two of your players playing against each other in a final. It’s a good problem to have because it shows just how deep our team is this year.”
The singles title for Musialek punches his ticket to the 2011 USTA/ITA National Indoor Intercollegiate Championships, which will be held at the USTA Billie Jean King National Tennis Center in Flushing, N.Y. Nov. 3-6. The native of Dax, France, is 10-3 this fall with several key wins over highly ranked foes, including No. 45 Nick Andres of California and No. 113 Ben Chen of Texas. The senior is 88-40 during his career at Kentucky.
Quigley had already sealed a spot in the National Indoor Intercollegiate Championships after winning the singles consolation title at the ITA All-American Championships in Tulsa, Okla., a few weeks back. The native of Pewee Valley, Ky., is a two-time singles champion at the Ohio Valley Regional Indoor Championships, winning the title in 2009 and 2010. Over the past three seasons at the tournament, Quigley has posted an 18-1 record in singles, having only dropped three sets.
Quigley is having a fantastic fall season, sitting at 16-3 overall. For his career, Quigley is 134-42 as a Wildcat, just 10 wins shy of tying Paul Varga for the school record for career singles wins. Varga went 144-80 during his UK career.
The Wildcats dominated play in the singles main draw all weekend long, with UK stars Quigley, Musialek, Anthony Rossi, Panav Jha and Tom Jomby filling five of the eight spots in the singles main draw quarterfinals with Quigley, Musialek and Rossi advancing into the semifinals. The all-Kentucky final on Monday was the fourth match during the tournament that featured a Kentucky player competing against another Kentucky player. All told, there were three finals played at the event with Kentucky being represented in each one of them.
The tournament run concluded with Kentucky’s top-six players at the event – Quigley, Musialek, Rossi, Jomby, Alejandro Gomez and Jha – going 27-5 in the singles main draw with only one player failing to advance to the quarterfinals. Even more impressive for UK is only one of their top-six players were eliminated from the tournament by a player from another school. Quigley, Rossi, Jomby and Jha all were eliminated from the tournament by another UK player.
“What an outstanding tournament we had,” UK head coach Dennis Emery said. “Having five players in the quarterfinals and three players in the semifinals of a tournament of this level really speaks to the depth of our team and how our guys are playing right now. I couldn’t be prouder of them.”
After the singles final was over, Quigley and Musialek teamed up in the doubles final against Tennessee’s Mikelis Libietis and Hunter Reese. The UT duo would storm out to an early lead 5-0 in the match, but Kentucky would respond by earning a break and cutting the lead to 5-3. After UT held serve to make it 6-3, the Vols earned a key break to go up 7-3 and then held serve again to clinch the match 8-3.
“We talked about starting better in doubles than we did in the semifinals yesterday, but we started slow again and got in too big of a hole,” Kauffmann said. “We tried to make a push there by getting a break but we didn’t have the push that we did in the semis. We had more mileage on our legs than they did, but that is a really good Tennessee doubles team that we played today and they deserve credit for playing better than we did and getting the win.”
Hosted by Columbia University, the USTA/ITA National Intercollegiate Indoor Championships features a 32-player singles draw and a 20-team doubles draw. Heading the field are champions from USTA/ITA Division I Regional Championships held across the country in October, winners of the USTA/ITA National Small College “Super Bowl,” and the singles quarterfinalists, doubles finalists and consolation champions from the ITA Men’s All-American Championships.
The USTA/ITA National Indoor Intercollegiate Championships was inaugurated in 1978 for the men and 1984 for the women. Past champions and finalists include current professionals John Isner (Georgia), James Blake (Harvard), Somdev Devvarman (Virginia), Irina Falconi (Georgia Tech), Lisa Raymond (Florida) and Bob and Mike Bryan (Stanford).
Kentucky will be in action again starting Wednesday when it travels to the Crimson Tide Invitaitonal in Tuscaloosa, Ala.
For more information on the Kentucky men’s tennis team, follow “UKMensTennis” on Twitter or search “University of Kentucky Men’s Tennis Team” on Facebook.
USTA/ITA Ohio Valley Regional Indoor Championships
Goodfriend Tennis Center/Knoxville Racquet Club – Knoxville, Tenn.
Results/Schedule of Play – All Times Eastern
Thursday, Oct. 20
Singles First Round:
No. 3 Eric Quigley (UK) def. Robert Salcedo (Dayton) 6-0, 6-0
No. 95 Anthony Rossi (UK) def. Ray Leonard (Ball State) 6-1, 6-1
Alejandro Gomez (UK) def. Elfore Zito (MTSU) 7-6, 6-2
Panav Jha (UK) def. Jose Berardo (Murray State) 6-2, 6-0
Sander Gille (ETSU) def. Maks Gold (UK) 6-4, 6-2
Joe Salisbury (Memphis) def. Ryuji Hirooka (UK) 6-2, 6-2
No. 20 Alex Musialek (UK) def. Michael Lyzwa (Wright State) 6-1, 6-0
Doubles First Round:
Alejandro Gomez/Panav Jha (UK) def. Patrick Bandy/Jimmy Roebker (Xavier) 8-2
Maks Gold/Ryuji Hirooka (UK) def. William Hever/Pawel Poziomski (Purdue) 8-5
Tom Jomby/Anthony Rossi (UK) vs. Cameron Dickerson/Forrest Edwards (MTSU) 8-4
Doubles Second Round:
No. 19 Eric Quigley/Alex Musialek (UK) def. Renato Antun/Rafael Matos (Belmont) 3-3, ret.
Brandon Fickey/Edward Jones (UT) def. Tom Jomby/Anthony Rossi (UK) 8-6
Maks Gold/Ryuji Hirooka (UK) def. Marlon Brand/Ben Davis (MTSU) 8-4
Alejandro Gomez/Panav Jha (UK) def. Jesus Bandres/Sander Gille (ETSU) 8-3
Friday, Oct. 21
Singles Second Round:
No. 3 Eric Quigley (UK) def. Rodrigo Amaral (Belmont) 6-1, 6-2
No. 20 Alex Musialek (UK) def. Hugo Klientovsky (EKU) 6-3, 6-1
No. 95 Anthony Rossi (UK) def. Will Kendall (Indiana) 6-2, 6-3
Alejandro Gomez (UK) def. Pawel Poziomski (Purdue) 6-2, 6-2
Tom Jomby (UK) def. Richard Canelas (Xavier) 6-3, 6-3
Panav Jha (UK) def. Saymon Tatarczyk (Purdue) 6-3, 7-5
Singles Third Round:
No. 3 Eric Quigley (UK) def. Dimitrije Tasic (Indiana) 6-3, 6-1
No. 20 Alex Musialek (UK) def. Syrym Abdukhailikov (Tennessee Tech) 6-7, 7-6, 6-2
No. 95 Anthony Rossi (UK) def. David O’Hare (Memphis) 6-1, 6-2
Tom Jomby (UK) def. Isade Juneau (Indiana) 6-3, 6-2
Andrew Carter (Louisville) def. Alejandro Gomez (UK) 6-4, 6-4
Panav Jha (UK) def. Sebastian Stiefelmeyer (Louisville) 3-6, 6-4, 7-6
Singles Consolation:
Andrew Hanley (Dayton) def. Maks Gold (UK) 6-2, 4-6, [10-6]
Ryuji Hirooka (UK) def. Joao Maio (EKU) 6-0, 6-0
Saturday, Oct. 22
Doubles Round of 16:
No. 19 Eric Quigley/Alex Musialek (UK) def. Will Kendall/Dimitrije Tasic (Indiana) 8-6
Maks Gold/Ryuji Hirooka (UK) def. Zach Ervin/Sam O’Neill (Butler) 8-6
Mikelis Libietis/Hunter Reese (Tennessee) def. Alejandro Gomez/Panav Jha (UK) 8-3
Doubles Quarterfinals:
No. 19 Eric Quigley/Alex Musialek def. Andrew Carter/Sebastian Stiefelmeyer (Louisville) 8-5
No. 38 Isade Juneau/Jeremy Langer (Indiana) def. Maks Gold/Ryuji Hirooka (UK) 8-6
Singles Round of 16:
No. 3 Eric Quigley (UK) def. Mark Kovacs (Purdue) 6-1, 6-4
No. 20 Alex Musialek (UK) def. Jeremy Langer (Indiana) 6-3, 6-2
No. 95 Anthony Rossi (UK) def. Michael Lippens (Tennessee) 6-3, 6-4
Tom Jomby (UK) def. Edward Jones (Tennessee) 7-6 (5), 3-6, 6-3
Panav Jha (UK) def. Mikelis Libietis (Tennessee) 6-3, 7-6 (6)
Singles Consolation Second Round
Ryuji Hirooka (UK) def. Brandon MacDonald (Xavier) 6-3, 6-1
Singles Consolation Third Round
Ryuji Hirooka (UK) def. Diego Acosta (Purdue) 6-3, 6-2
Sunday, Oct. 23
Singles Quarterfinals:
No. 3 Eric Quigley (UK) def. Andrew Carter (Louisville) 6-3, 6-4
No. 20 Alex Musialek (UK) def. Panav Jha (UK) 6-4, 6-1
No. 95 Anthony Rossi (UK) def. Tom Jomby (UK) 6-4, 5-5 (def.)
Singles Semifinals:
No. 3 Eric Quigley (UK) def. No. 55 Josh MacTaggart (Indiana) 6-2, 6-2
No. 20 Alex Musialek (UK) def. No. 95 Anthony Rossi (UK) 6-3, 1-6, 6-3
Doubles Semifinals:
No. 19 Eric Quigley/Alex Musialek (UK) def. No. 38 Isade Juneau/Jeremy Langer (Indiana) 8-6
Singles Consolation Quarterfinals:
Ryuji Hirooka (UK) def. Manuel Barroetavena (Chattanooga) 7-6, 6-4
Singles Consolation Semifinals:
Ryuji Hirooka (UK) def. Brandon Fickey (Tennessee) 0-6, 6-2, [10-7]
Singles Consolation Final:
Jimmy Roebker (Xavier) def. Ryuji Hirooka (UK) 6-3, 6-3
Monday, Oct. 24
Singles Final – No. 20 Alex Musialek (UK) def. No. 3 Eric Quigley (UK) 6-3, 6-3
Doubles Final – Mikelis Libietis/Hunter Reese (UT) def. No. 19 Eric Quigley/Alex Musialek (UK) 8-3
