Tuesday, 03/22/2011

IRVING, Texas – The Baylor men’s and women’s duo of Julian Bley and Nina Secerbegovic swept the Big 12 Player of the Week honors for their performance over the past week, as announced Tuesday by league officials. Bley helped the Baylor men to a 2-0 record during the week, while Secerbegovic led the women to a 3-1 mark.

Last week, Bley went undefeated in singles (2-0) and doubles (2-0) to propel the Baylor men to victories over No. 1 ranked Tennessee and No. 28 Louisville.

Against the top ranked Volunteers, Bley captured a third-set tiebreaker in the final singles match on to give Baylor a 4-3 win and its first victory ever over a No. 1 ranked team. In the third set of his match, Bley rallied from deficits of 3-1 and then 4-2 to force a tiebreaker, which he eventually took 7-5 to give Baylor the victory.

Bley then pushed his singles win streak to five matches with a straight-set victory in the Louisville match. The wins raise Bley’s record to13-9 overall and 6-3 in dual-match play.

During the two matches, Bley partnered with Kike Grangeiro in doubles play to post an 8-6 win against Tennessee and an 8-3 triumph versus Louisville, improving the duo to 11-1 in dual match play.

For the Baylor men, it marks the first Big 12 Player of the Week honor since Denes Lukacs received the award on April 6, 2009.

On the women’s side, Secerbegovic won all four of her singles matches while posting a 3-1 doubles record as BU went 3-1 last week. On Monday, the 34th-ranked junior defeated 85th-ranked Kayla Rizzolo (6-1, 6-2) in the Bears' 5-2 win over No. 3 Miami (Fla.).

Secerbegovic recorded three additional straight-set wins, including a 6-2, 6-0 victory on Wednesday against Kentucky, which she coupled with an 8-3 doubles triumph. Secerbegovic also won 6-4, 6-1 in singles and 8-2 in doubles action in BU's narrow loss to Kansas State on Friday before posting victories of 6-4, 6-2 in singles and 8-4 in doubles as the Bears defeated Kansas on Sunday.

The honor is in its first week of the season, and marks the second time in Secerbegovic’s career she has been named Big 12 Player of the Week. She had previously earned the award on March 16, 2010.

With the four singles wins, Secerbegovic improved her personal win streak to nine matches and her overall record to 14-3 on the season. She is tied for the team lead with a 12-1 dual-match singles record. In doubles, she is 13-6 overall on the season, which ranks second on the team.

Baylor’s 16th-ranked men (10-3) will be action at home on Tuesday against No. 8 Stanford at 5 p.m., while the women (11-3) will be back on the court on Wednesday, hosting No. 33 SMU at 5 p.m. at the Baylor Tennis Center.