April 8, 2014

LEXINGTON, Ky. – The No. 14 University of Kentucky men’s tennis team will host the No. 1 Ohio State Buckeyes and the Morehead State Eagles on Wednesday afternoon in a non-conference doubleheader at the Hilary J. Boone Varsity Tennis Center in Lexington, Ky. UK will square off with the No. 1 Buckeyes at 2 p.m. ET, and the Morehead State match will start at 7 p.m. ET.

“This is another good test for the boys,” UK head coach Cedric Kauffmann said in advance of Wednesday’s matches with OSU and MSU. “I expect us to play our best match this season tomorrow afternoon. All three doubles and all six singles positions need to step up to win this match. It will be difficult, but we can do it.”

This will be the second time this season that the Wildcats and Buckeyes have squared off this season, with Ohio State, ranked No. 5 at the time, knocked off the then-No. 17 Wildcats in Columbus, 4-0.

Kentucky comes into Wednesday’s doubleheader fresh off of a 4-2 win over No. 26 Vanderbilt to improve to 8-2 in Southeastern Conference action this season, and with the win, clinched a double-bye in the 2014 Southeastern Conference Tournament Championship to be held in Nashville, Tenn., April 16-20.

UK, who remained at No. 14 in this week’s Intercollegiate Tennis Association rankings, is 16-7 overall on the season, and has already collected two top-10 wins this season, knocking off No. 7 Duke and No. 8 Texas A&M earlier this season.

In singles, Kentucky continues to have three ranked players in its lineup, with the top-ranked player on the team being No. 13 Tom Jomby. The senior from Nantes, France has lost just a handful of matches this season, playing the No. 1 singles position for the entirety of the season. In singles, Jomby is expected to go up against No. 9 Peter Kobelt on the first court.

Also in singles, Kentucky will boast No. 95 Alejandro Gomez, who is projected to play No. 2 singles, and then No. 113, Beck Pennington, who will play at the No. 3 singles position.

For Ohio State, the Buckeyes singles lineup features four ranked players, topped by Kobelt, at No. 9 nationally in singles. Also ranked for OSU is Herkko Pollanen at No. 74, Hunter Callahan at No. 109, and Kevin Metka at No. 124.

Kentucky’s match with Morehead State will start at 7 p.m. ET at the Hilary J. Boone Varsity Tennis Center.

For continuing coverage of UK men’s tennis, log on to UKathletics.com.