University of Delaware Athletics
Blue Hens Riding High Into CAA Men’s Tennis Championship
4/21/2022 11:25:00 AM | Men's Tennis
NEWARK, Del. – The University of Delaware men's tennis team is down in North Carolina, preparing for the CAA Championships that will begin on Friday at Elon's Jimmy Powell Tennis Center. The Blue Hens arrived as one of the hottest teams in the conference, riding a nine-match winning streak into the postseason and earning the tournament's No. 3 seed.
The Blue & Gold have had a historic run to end the regular season, putting together one of the longest winning streaks in program history to earn Delaware's highest ever seeding at the CAA Championship. Through the first 13 matches of the spring, the Blue Hens held a 5-8 record and had not been able to string two wins together through the first seven weeks of the season. Sure enough, the wins began to pile up. The winning streak started with a 6-1 win over St. Francis Brooklyn on March 20 and then gained serious momentum with three-straight wins over the team's Spring Break trip to South Carolina.
"I knew deep in my heart that we were doing all the right things," said Director of Tennis Pablo Montana. "We lost a couple of heartbreakers to St. John's and Richmond early on, but I knew we were right there with them. I told our guys to continue trusting the process and not worry about the wins and losses. As long as we stayed true and consistent to our Key Performance Indicators, the results would take care of themselves."
The Blue Hens have won in all sorts of fashions throughout the streak, going 5-0 at the Delaware Tennis Courts on campus as well as winning four matches on the road. UD has shut out three opponents as well as won four tight 4-3 matches, including two one-point decisions over CAA opponents.
A huge part of that success has been the singles play of the Blue Hens as five different players have registered at least 10 singles victories in the squad's 22 dual matches this spring. Alexandre Gluck has set the freshman record with 20 individual victories this year and, as a team, the Blue Hens have shattered the program's single-season wins total with 132 over the fall and spring campaigns. In the current winning streak, Delaware has gone 36-12 in singles with winning records at five of the six positions. James Wilkinson has led the way at the No. 1 position with a 7-2 record over the last nine matches, while multiple players have combined to go 6-1 at No. 2, 6-2 at No. 5 and 8-0 at No. 6.
"No doubt it adds a sense of calmness when I look at our singles lineup and see the consistency and confidence my top six singles players have displayed all spring," said Montana. "We can lose the doubles point and most coaches start panicking as they start the singles already down 1-0. I look at our starting lineup and I have all the confidence in the world that we can get four singles points against any team in our conference."
One of the leaders has been graduate student Guilherme Valdoleiros, who enters the CAA Championship on a personal 11-match winning streak. During the team's last nine matches, he has gone 6-0 at the No. 5 position and 3-0 when playing at No. 6. Not only is Valdoleiros beating his opponents, but he is doing so swiftly as eight of his last 11 wins have been in straight sets and he has had 10 sets where he allowed two points or fewer. Arguably his biggest win of the season came against James Madison on April 9 when he and his opponent were tied at one set apiece when the skies opened. With the overall match tied 3-3, the final set was to determine the team victory. After a lengthy delay where the teams drove to Wilmington to continue the match indoors, Valdoleiros proceeded to cruise to a 6-0 set victory to give Delaware the CAA win.
"Gui is a tremendous competitor and he hates to lose more than he enjoys winning. I know that every time he is playing that last match for us and it's the decider, our chances of winning the match increase drastically. Gui is the consummate professional and he deserves every win he gets as he puts in all the extra time on and off the court."
While Delaware's singles play has been nothing short of dominant over the past month, the team's play in doubles has been improving as well. The Blue Hens have taken the doubles point in seven of the nine matches during the winning streak and began seeing a turnaround when Montana switched around the pairings. The duo of Wilkinson and Pierce Gilheany are 6-3 at the No. 1 position during the streak, while Valdoleiros and Pascal Wagemaker are 5-3 as a duo and have taken over at No. 2.
"I told my players in January that it doesn't matter if we have the right doubles pairings right now; it matters by the time we get to the conference tournament. We go through a lot of trials throughout the spring to find the right pairings and what's working. I'm looking for how well our players communicate with each other on and off the court, how they complement each other's game during competition, and how I feel they will match up against the field."
Montana has clearly been pushing the right buttons and found the right recipe for his lineup as UD not only enters the postseason having won nine straight but has won the most matches of any other team in the conference. Delaware will put its No. 3 seed to the test on Friday afternoon when the squad takes on No. 6 Drexel in the CAA Quarterfinals at 2 p.m. The Blue Hens, who defeated the Dragons 4-3 in their regular-season finale last weekend, will be looking to advance past the quarterfinal round for the first time in their 20th trip to the conference tournament.
For the latest on the Delaware men's tennis program, follow the Blue Hens on Twitter @DelawareMTEN and Instagram @DelawareMTen.
The Blue & Gold have had a historic run to end the regular season, putting together one of the longest winning streaks in program history to earn Delaware's highest ever seeding at the CAA Championship. Through the first 13 matches of the spring, the Blue Hens held a 5-8 record and had not been able to string two wins together through the first seven weeks of the season. Sure enough, the wins began to pile up. The winning streak started with a 6-1 win over St. Francis Brooklyn on March 20 and then gained serious momentum with three-straight wins over the team's Spring Break trip to South Carolina.
"I knew deep in my heart that we were doing all the right things," said Director of Tennis Pablo Montana. "We lost a couple of heartbreakers to St. John's and Richmond early on, but I knew we were right there with them. I told our guys to continue trusting the process and not worry about the wins and losses. As long as we stayed true and consistent to our Key Performance Indicators, the results would take care of themselves."
The Blue Hens have won in all sorts of fashions throughout the streak, going 5-0 at the Delaware Tennis Courts on campus as well as winning four matches on the road. UD has shut out three opponents as well as won four tight 4-3 matches, including two one-point decisions over CAA opponents.
A huge part of that success has been the singles play of the Blue Hens as five different players have registered at least 10 singles victories in the squad's 22 dual matches this spring. Alexandre Gluck has set the freshman record with 20 individual victories this year and, as a team, the Blue Hens have shattered the program's single-season wins total with 132 over the fall and spring campaigns. In the current winning streak, Delaware has gone 36-12 in singles with winning records at five of the six positions. James Wilkinson has led the way at the No. 1 position with a 7-2 record over the last nine matches, while multiple players have combined to go 6-1 at No. 2, 6-2 at No. 5 and 8-0 at No. 6.
"No doubt it adds a sense of calmness when I look at our singles lineup and see the consistency and confidence my top six singles players have displayed all spring," said Montana. "We can lose the doubles point and most coaches start panicking as they start the singles already down 1-0. I look at our starting lineup and I have all the confidence in the world that we can get four singles points against any team in our conference."
One of the leaders has been graduate student Guilherme Valdoleiros, who enters the CAA Championship on a personal 11-match winning streak. During the team's last nine matches, he has gone 6-0 at the No. 5 position and 3-0 when playing at No. 6. Not only is Valdoleiros beating his opponents, but he is doing so swiftly as eight of his last 11 wins have been in straight sets and he has had 10 sets where he allowed two points or fewer. Arguably his biggest win of the season came against James Madison on April 9 when he and his opponent were tied at one set apiece when the skies opened. With the overall match tied 3-3, the final set was to determine the team victory. After a lengthy delay where the teams drove to Wilmington to continue the match indoors, Valdoleiros proceeded to cruise to a 6-0 set victory to give Delaware the CAA win.
"Gui is a tremendous competitor and he hates to lose more than he enjoys winning. I know that every time he is playing that last match for us and it's the decider, our chances of winning the match increase drastically. Gui is the consummate professional and he deserves every win he gets as he puts in all the extra time on and off the court."
While Delaware's singles play has been nothing short of dominant over the past month, the team's play in doubles has been improving as well. The Blue Hens have taken the doubles point in seven of the nine matches during the winning streak and began seeing a turnaround when Montana switched around the pairings. The duo of Wilkinson and Pierce Gilheany are 6-3 at the No. 1 position during the streak, while Valdoleiros and Pascal Wagemaker are 5-3 as a duo and have taken over at No. 2.
"I told my players in January that it doesn't matter if we have the right doubles pairings right now; it matters by the time we get to the conference tournament. We go through a lot of trials throughout the spring to find the right pairings and what's working. I'm looking for how well our players communicate with each other on and off the court, how they complement each other's game during competition, and how I feel they will match up against the field."
Montana has clearly been pushing the right buttons and found the right recipe for his lineup as UD not only enters the postseason having won nine straight but has won the most matches of any other team in the conference. Delaware will put its No. 3 seed to the test on Friday afternoon when the squad takes on No. 6 Drexel in the CAA Quarterfinals at 2 p.m. The Blue Hens, who defeated the Dragons 4-3 in their regular-season finale last weekend, will be looking to advance past the quarterfinal round for the first time in their 20th trip to the conference tournament.
For the latest on the Delaware men's tennis program, follow the Blue Hens on Twitter @DelawareMTEN and Instagram @DelawareMTen.
Players Mentioned
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