The MEN

UCLA
The Bruins, ranked No. 4 nationally, opened the season with three 7-0 wins over UC Irvine, San Diego and BYU, and are stocked full of talent once again this year. It kept getting better from there when for the first time in 15 years, UCLA didn’t surrender a single point to Stanford, registering a 7-0 victory over the 19th-ranked Cardinal. The Bruins also shut out Cal.

Coach Billy Martin would like nothing better than to experience another national title like the Bruins won in 2005 after watching Pepperdine hoist the trophy last year. Martin is coming off his eighth-consecutive 20-win season, as the ‘06 team ended the year with a 20-6 overall record. Martin has never had a team finish out of the top 5 at the NCAA Championships.

The Bruins are again led by NCAA singles champ, Benjamin Kohlloeffel, who is backed up by freshman sensation Haythem Abid of Tunisia. Veteran Chris Surapol and sophomore Mathieu Dehaine hold down the Nos. 3 and 4 spots, while Phillip Gruendler and Jeremy Drean play 5 and 6. UCLA has a tough schedule ahead with No. 2 Baylor as well as top 15 squads USC and Pepperdine on the schedule. But Martin has shown an ability to win the big dual match and should his team keep healthy, they will be a major threat come May.

USC
After a season in which they lost nine 4-3 matches (seven in the Pac-10), finished 8-14 (1-6 in conference) and missed the NCAAs, coach Peter Smith’s Trojans plan on sneaking up on some people this season. Early on, they did just that with an impressive sweep of the Bay Area teams. USC beat No. 19 Stanford 5-2 and No. 18 Cal 7-0. Top player Jamil Al-Agba led the sweep against the Bears with a win over No. 19-ranked Pierre Mouillon. Others getting wins were senior Dejan Cvetkovic, junior Kaes Van’t Hof, freshman Robert Farah of Columbia, San Diego freshman Jason McNaughton and sophomore Garrett Snyder of Newport Beach. Coach Peter Smith lost just one player off last year’s team, so this year’s squad is loaded with depth and talent, mixing upperclassmen with some talented kids. Camarillo native Al-Agba appears to have recovered from a leg injury that plagued him last season and seems to be prepared for a strong campaign. Other returners include Adam Loucks, Chong Wang and Whit Livingston.

PEPPERDINE
The only way for Pepperdine to match last season’s amazing success is to win another NCAA team crown, and after losing four very competent senior starters, ITA coach of the year Adam Steinberg will be hard pressed to attain that nearly impossible feat. But despite losing all those starters, the Waves still locked down a preseason top- 10 ranking and with some fine recruiting by Steinberg, the team remains ultra-competitive.

All three of Pepperdine’s freshmen started in the Waves’ lineup that bested St Mary’s and Santa Clara. The three fabulous freshmen are Bassam Beidas and Mahmoud Kamel of Cairo, and James Lemke of Australia. Junior Andre Begemann is one holdover from last year’s spectacular squad and is playing No. 1, while another holdover, senior Richard Johnson, is playing No. 2. Another Egyptian native, sophomore Omar Altmann, is playing No. 5 behind Beidas and Lemke. The Waves are once again expected to win the WCC but have a tough out-of-conference schedule that includes February dates with five top 20 teams: Florida State, UCLA, Virginia, Texas and Ohio State.

San Diego State
San Diego State opened the season with wins over UC Riverside and Concordia, but was shut out by USC. Paced by 28th-ranked seniors Christian Groh and Markus Dickhardt at No. 1 and 2, the Aztecs should make a strong run in the Mountain West Conference.

Coach Gene Carswell brought in transfer Anthony Gomez from COD to play No. 3, while Russian freshman Achim Ceban is playing No. 4. Another COD transfer, Robert Sabo, is playing No. 5. San Diego local Michael Beran and Billy Timu are both getting time at No. 6. Last year, San Diego State fell in the final of the Mountain West Conference tournament to TCU.

University of San Diego
USD, ranked No. 49, is off to a slow start with an 0-4 record thanks to a crushing opening schedule. The road-trip matches began at 4th-ranked UCLA, where they dropped the contest 0-7. USD has never won against the powerhouse Bruins. Sophomore Thomas Liversage did hold his own in the first set in No. 1 singles against 5th-ranked Benjamin Kohlloeffel but fell to him 6-4, 6-0. And at the third singles line, Chris Coetzee barely lost 7-5(5), 7-5 to Mathieu Dehaine.

Next came a 6-1 loss in a hotly contested meeting with 52nd-ranked Northwestern. Coetzee, again at No. 3 singles, took the only point in a three setter. Liversage at No. 1 singles, Ryoseki Guichi at No. 4 and Charles Wolmarans at No. 5 also lost in three sets. Jonas Mouly/Wolmarans won their doubles 8-5. Then Wake Forest, ranked 24th, handed the Toreros a 7-0 loss. After that, it was a 4-3 loss to No. 17 Boise State. Mouly stepped in at No. 1 against the Deamon Deacons. However, USD should still be a force in the West Coast Conference, which only features one team, Pepperdine, with a top 20 national ranking.

The WOMEN

USC
The Trojans feel like they have found the missing piece to get them over the hump this season. Freshman Sarah Fansler has played some No. 1 already after a stellar fall that saw her win the ITA West Regionals and earn a No. 9 national ranking in singles and No. 23 in doubles with Dianne Matias. USC was 21-4 last year (7-1 in Pac 10 play) and finished the season ranked No. 3 in the nation. The Women of Troy advanced to the NCAA Semifinals before falling to Miami, 4-1. Fansler was homeschooled in Mission Viejo but comes to USC as one of the nation’s top recruits after earning a No. 2 national ranking in the 18s and 16s. She will play behind junior Lindsey Nelson, an NCAA singles finalist last year. Last year’s top Pac-10 freshman, Amanda Fink, will anchor the No. 3 spot followed by Anca Anastasiu, Judy DeVera and Tulane transfer Julie Smekodub, who’s playing No. 1 doubles with Nelson.

With Stanford finally dropping a match and looking a little vulnerable (after winning 89 straight, the Cardinal lost to Georgia Tech at the Indoors), the Trojans have a good shot at winning the whole enchilada. They swept No. 59 USD behind the formidable threesome of Nelson, Fansler and Fink, but the bottom three should not be forgotten as DeVera, Anastasiu and Matias will be very hard to put down this season.

UCLA
All eyes were on highly recruited freshman sensation Yasmin Schnack early on. Schnack, from Sacramento, started the year as the highest-ranked Bruin at No. 28 based on her performance in the fall. Her accolades as a junior player included being ranked No. 33 in the ITF world rankings and No. 4 in the USTA 18s. She has played in the U.S. Open, French Open, Australian Open, and Wimbledon Junior Championships.

An injury forced Schnack to miss some playing time to start the year, but she seemed to have locked down the No. 2 spot. She is followed in the national rankings by No. 25 Riza Zalameda, who’s again playing No.1, No. 40 Ashley Joelson and No. 61 Tracy Lin. In doubles, Schnack and Zalameda are ranked No. 17. Other newcomers for Coach Stella Sampras Webster’s squad include Stephanie Wetmore, Becky Duesler, Sarah Yang and Alexandra Fleming. Alex McGoodwin and Elizabeth Lumpkin are playing Nos. 5 and 6 singles. After winning one match and dropping two at the national Indoors, the Bruins were likely heading into March with a top-15 ranking.

PEPPERDINE
Pepperdine is looking to take a big step up this season and showed some promise at the National Indoors. While the Waves fell to eventual champ Georgia Tech in the main draw, they picked up two wins in the consolation bracket over TCU and Wisconsin for a 2-1 record at the Indoors, improving their overall record to 4-2. The Waves are lead by Romanian Bianca Dulgheru, who is backed up by SoCal native Sylvia Kosakowski and new recruit Katia Sabate from Spain. Caroline Raba and Eva Dickes are playing Nos. 4 and 5. Another Braverman has decided to attend Pepperdine, Jilian, who is playing No. 6. Her sister Natalie played No. 1 for the Waves in 2005. Canadian freshman Tania Rice will also see playing time, as will Latvian Anete Bandere. While Pepperdine has improved, coach Gualberto Escudero’s squad will be hard pressed to upend USC, which shut them out at the beginning of the season. But a trip to the NCAA Sweet 16 is possible.

LONG BEACH STATE
Domination has been the name of the game for Long Beach State the past couple of years. Just not against USC. The Lady 49ers, which have won the last three Big West titles, have never beaten the Trojans in 24 meetings, including this season’s opening 7-0 loss. Long Beach State’s players even had revenge on their minds this time since it was USC that knocked them out of the NCAAs last year in the second round.

Jenny Hilt-Costello’s team came into the match ranked No. 27 in the nation, but couldn’t take a set in singles against the powerful No. 3 Trojans. LBSU returns a powerful 1-2-3 punch. Hannah Grady will dominate again this year at No. 1 (she was 19-6 in singles, 21-2 in doubles last year), as will Katy Williams and Stephanie Bengson. Jessica Weeks, Emmanuelle Tabatruong, Sandra Rocha and Rachael Porsz round out the squad.

UC IRVINE
UC Irvine’s women’s team is off to one of its best starts in years with a 5-1 record as of early February. The Lady Anteaters show a lot of depth since virtually all of last year’s starters are back this year. The team shut out San Diego State and Hawaii to start. But coach Mike Edles sees a challenge with conference foe Cal State Long Beach.

“They also have everybody back and made quite a jump last year,” he said.

Cal Poly, Santa Barbara and Northridge are other teams to watch. As for Irvine, the maturation process is starting to show some results. “We’re starting three sophomores, yet they have a lot of experience and have picked up their games over the past year,” Edles said.

Among them are Clare Fermin, who jumped from No. 6 to No. 3 singles. “So far, our depth has been with singles. We’ve been consistent at the Nos. 4, 5 and 6 positions and we’ve also picked it up in doubles.”

No. 1 Becky Bernhard even showed improvements. She spent the off-season practicing in SoCal. She’s from the NorCal town of Roseville, where she has sometimes had trouble finding quality sparring partners.

Bernhard made some noise early by beating Pepperdine’s No. 1 and nationally ranked No. 22 Bianca Dulgeru 1 and 3. Other key returners are Inna Agababian, Heidi Kaloi, Jessica Broadfoot and Lisa Shih. The Anteaters have been hovering around the low 50s in the national ranking.

 

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