INDIANAPOLIS — The Conference USA Tournament Champion UTSA men's tennis team (17-8) will face LSU (17-8) in the first round of the NCAA Division I Men's Tennis Championship on Friday, May 8, at the Hurd Tennis Center in Waco, Texas. A time will be announced at a later date.
Making their fourth overall NCAA postseason appearance and the second (2012) under fifth-year head coach Jeff Kader, the Roadrunners — ranked 58th by the ITA — and the 27th-ranked Tigers will meet for the third time in a series LSU leads, 2-0. The last meeting was a 6-1 decision on Feb. 1, 2003 in Baton Rouge, La.
The winner of Friday's match will face either No. 2 national seed and host Baylor (21-5) or Bryant (8-11) in the second round on May 9.
UTSA earned C-USA's automatic bid to the NCAA Championship after sweeping through the league tournament on April 17-19 in Norfolk, Va. The Roadrunners edged Southern Miss, 4-3, before upsetting No. 58 Old Dominion and No. 54 Rice, both by 4-2 scores, to claim their second league crown in the last four years an fifth overall.
The Roadrunners are 0-3 all-time in NCAA Tournament matches, including a 4-0 setback to 14-seed California in their last appearance in 2012 in Berkeley, Calif. UTSA also advanced to the NCAA postseason in 2010 (L, 4-0 at No. 3 Texas) and 2002 (L, 4-0 at Texas).
All NCAA Tournament matches will be regulation dual matches with three (3) eight-game, pro-set doubles played for one team point, followed by six (6) singles matches, each valued at one team point, played in best-of-three sets. Regular scoring will be used and a 12-point tiebreaker will be played at seven-games-all in doubles and at six-games-all in singles.
The winner of each site advances to the national championship on May 14-19, also at the Hurd Tennis Center in Waco.