University of Kentucky Team Page
LEXINGTON, Ky. - The University of Kentucky men's tennis team will kick off the 2012 fall season this weekend as the Wildcats will travel to Athens, Ga., to take part in the 2012 Southern Intercollegiate Tennis Tournament hosted by the University of Georgia. The tournament will start Friday and run through Monday at the Dan Magill Tennis Complex in Athens.
"I am excited to see the four players play this weekend," UK head coach Cedric Kauffmann said. "We got a challenging draw, but I am looking to see how they are going to respond. We have a couple freshmen that are going to be competing, so we are excited to see them compete this weekend."
Kentucky will have four representatives in the singles draw, featuring juniors Ryuji Hirooka and Grant Roberts, and freshmen Michael Binder and Beck Pennington. The action in Athens will be the first for Binder and Pennington in the Blue and White.
Hirooka kicks off the UK schedule Friday morning at 10:00 a.m. ET when the junior hailing from Tokyo, Japan will take on one of the (9-16) seeds, William Kallberg, from fellow Southeastern Conference member Ole Miss. Hirooka will be in the quarter featuring the number one overall seed in the tournament.
The Friday action continues at 11:30 a.m. ET with Binder and Pennington starting their UK careers. Binder will take on Kris Yee of Vanderbilt with Pennington facing another seeded player, in Florent Diep of Florida. Binder and Pennington will operate out of Juan Spir's quarter, who is seeded fourth overall in the championship.
Later in the afternoon at 3:00 p.m. ET, Grant Roberts will face off against Nathan Pasha of Georgia. Pasha is another seeded player, as three of the four UK players will face a seeded player in the opening round of the tournament. Roberts is in the Jonas Lutjen quarter of the draw, who is seeded second overall in the tournament.
In the doubles draw, Hirooka and Binder will combine to form one team representing UK with Pennington and Roberts consisting of the other team. Hirooka and Binder face Adrian Forberg Skogeng and Joe Rogers of Ole Miss in the opening round Friday. Also in the opening round Friday, Pennington and Roberts will take on Rhys Johnson and Jeff Offerdahl of Vandy.
