BATON ROUGE — For the second straight year the LSU men’s tennis team was one of 16 programs selected to play in the USTA/ITA National Team Championships.
The tournament will be hosted by the University of Washington, Feb. 17-20 at Nordstrom Tennis Stadium and Seattle Tennis Club. Only 13 teams are selected for the National Indoors each season, with three coming from regional qualifiers.
“This is a huge honor,” said LSU head coach Jeff Brown. “It’s going to be a chance for us to compete against some top level competition and hopefully get some quality wins.”
LSU was one of four SEC teams to be selected, along with Florida, Georgia, Ole Miss and South Carolina.
In addition, the Tigers had several players near the top of the ITA Southeast Regional rankings.
Ken Skupski and Mark Growcott ranked No. 3 and No. 14 in singles respectively. The duo also ranked No. 2 in doubles along with teammates Colt Gaston and Danny Bryan who ranked fourth.
2006 USTA/ITA Indoor Championships Teams
Baylor
Duke
Florida
Florida State
Georgia
Illinois
LSU
Mississippi
Pennsylvania (Regional Qualifier)
Pepperdine
South Carolina
UCLA
Virginia
Washington
Central Region Qualifier
Mountain Region Qualifier
Southeast Regional Rankings
Singles
1. John Isner, Georgia
2. Erling Tveit, Ole Miss
3. Ken Skupski, LSU
4. Greg Ouellette, Florida
5. Luigi D’Agord, Miami
6. Josh Cohen, Miami
7. Andreas Siljestrom, MTSU
8. Joseph Jung, Alabama
9. Vladimir Obradovic, Florida
10. Eric Claesson, Ole Miss
11. Dirk Britzen, South Florida
12. Bruno Agostinelli, Kentucky
13. Chris Brandi, Florida
14. Mark Growcott, LSU
15. Matic Omerzel, Georgia
16. Ivan Bjelica, Mississippi State
17. Alex Hume, Kentucky
18. AlexSchweizer, Auburn
19. Strahinja Bobusic, Georgia
20. Tim Krebs, Miami
21. Philippe Frayssinoux, Mississippi State
22. Nestor Briceno, Florida
23. Juan Pablo Di Cesare, Ole Miss
24. Janne Holmia, Florida
25. Nate Emge, Kentucky
26. Colin Purcell, Georgia
27. Pierre Mouillon, Mississippi State
28. Ricardo Gonzalez, Georgia
29. Ryan Preston, Vanderbilt
30. Eric Hechtman, Miami
Doubles
1. Marco Born/ Andreas Siljestrom, MTSU
2. Mark Growcott/Ken Skupski, LSU
3. Strahinja Bobusic/Colin Purcell, Georgia
4. Danny Bryan/Colt Gaston, LSU
5. Eric Claesson/Erling Tveit, Ole Miss
6. Nate Emge/Alex Hume, Kentucky
7. Alex Jago/James Spence, Memphis
8. Brandon Allan/Kai Schledorn, MTSU
9. Josh Cohen/Eric Hechtman, Miami
10. Greg Ouellette/Janne Holmia, Florida
11. Kaden Hensel/Ben Rogers, Tennessee
12. Terence Nugent/Alex Schweizer, Auburn
13. Ivan Bjelica/ Jose-Carlos Pinto, Mississippi State
14. Jacob Klaeson/Bram ten Berge, Ole Miss
15. Anze Cevka/Martin Stiegwardt, Georgia State