SAN ANTONIO – UTSA men’s tennis will kick off the 2024 season on Saturday, traveling to Norman, Okla. to face the 22nd-ranked Oklahoma Sooners at the Gregg Wadley Indoor Tennis Pavilion at 11 a.m. The Roadrunners are playing the Sooners in back-to-back years and the third time in the past four seasons, matching up for the sixth time in program history.
Following the Match
Oklahoma Athletics will host Live Stats and fans can watch the action on every court via OU’s Playsight. Originally scheduled to be played outdoors, the match was moved into Wadley Indoor due to projected temperatures around 23 degrees with high winds locally at match time.
About the Roadrunners
The Roadrunners are looking to follow up strong from one of the best seasons in program history. During the 2022-23 season, UTSA captured the most wins since 1985 on an 18-7 record, reached the final of the Conference USA Championships and earned the program’s first At-Large bid for the school’s fifth appearance in the NCAA Championships. In addition, the Roadrunners had a doubles pair earn the ITA Texas Region Championship – a program-first – and advance to the National Quarterfinal. The same tandem earned a postseason win and reached the Round of 16 at the NCAA Doubles Championships. On top of all that, UTSA set new program records for ITA team ranking multiple times, reaching as high as 34th and ending the season at No. 42.
The Roadrunners return seven players from last year’s roster with the loss of senior Sebastian Rodriguez – one half of the ITA and NCAA postseason doubles pair.
UTSA welcomes back three seniors, including Alan Magadan (McAllen, Texas: 14-7 singles, 12-8 doubles), the other half of the ITA and postseason doubles – A Conference USA first-team singles and doubles selection last year. Classmates Jackson Ross (San Antonio, Texas: 9-7 singles, 8-9 doubles) and Garrett Skelly (The Woodlands, Texas: 6-4 singles, 9-10 doubles) join Magadan for their final year.
Juniors Tiago Torres (Lisbon, Portugal: 8-11 singles, 11-9 doubles), Danijal Muminovic (Tuzla, Bosnia: 13-8 singles) and Miguel Alonso (Veracruz, Mexico: 3-5 doubles) are also back in 2024. Torres was also a first team All-Conference USA selection in 2023 and represented Portugal in singles and doubles this summer at the World University Games in Chengdu, China.
Representing the returning sophomore class is Tomás Pinho (Oporto, Portugal: 11-8 singles, 13-8 doubles), who was ranked No. 115 on the ITA singles list coming out of the fall.
UTSA also bolstered the roster with the addition of freshmen Aleksa Markovic (Novi Sad, Serbia) and Santiago Flyckt (San Antonio, Texas).
The 2022-23 Conference USA Coach of the Year, fifth-year head coach Sergey Avdeyev leads the Roadrunners into their first season in the American Athletic Conference, alongside first-year assistant coach Dane Esses and second-year assistant David Caramanidis
About the Sooners
Ranked 22nd in the initial ITA spring poll, Oklahoma returns seven players from last year’s squad that ranked 31st in the final ITA poll and produced a 15-12 record after reaching the second round of the NCAA tournament. The Sooners defeated Baylor before falling to top-ranked Texas in the Big 12 Tournament last April, moving on with an NCAA At-Large bid to defeat NC State in the Athens, Ga. Regional.
Luis Alvarez (8-4 singles) and Alex Martinez (17-13 singles, 12-13 doubles) at 89th and 91st, respectively, while Martinez was a second-team All-Big 12 pick last year. Freshman Kholo Montsi also kicks off his career with a No. 125 ranking.
Series with Oklahoma
The Sooners are 5-0 against the Roadrunners, dating back to the first meeting in 1996. Meeting for the third time in the last four years, these teams also faced off in Norman in 2023 (L, 0-7) and 2021 (L, 3-4).
Up Next
The Roadrunners will open up their home schedule briefly with the very same team that closed out 2023 at the UTSA Tennis Center. UT Rio Grande Valley will travel to San Antonio for a Sunday, Jan. 21 match at 12 p.m. The following weekend pits the Roadrunners against third-ranked Texas and then either Utah or Oklahoma State in the ITA Kickoff Weekend in Austin at the Texas Tennis Center.
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