BATON ROUGE — The No. 15-ranked LSU men’s tennis team will battle Kentucky in its Southeastern Conference home opener Friday at 2 p.m. at the W.T. “Dub” Robins Tennis Stadium.
The Tigers (7-2, 1-1 SEC) hold a 28-11 all-time record against the Wildcats (7-5 1-1 SEC). In their last meeting in 2006, the Wildcats won 4-3 in Lexington, Ky.
“Kentucky is a team that will continue to improve as they get healthy,” LSU head coach Jeff Brown said. “Their top four players are very talented players and I expect a close match that could come down to the last point.”
The Tigers boast several players ranked in singles and doubles. Ken Skupski comes in at No. 21 and Danny Bryan is listed at No. 37 in singles. In doubles, the Tigers boasts two teams ranked in the top 10. Skupski and James Cluskey jumped one spot to No. 5. Bryan and Colt Gaston soared up the rankings to No. 9. The Tiger Tandem started the season 10-0 before falling to the No. 1 duo of Luis Flores and John Isner of Georgia last weekend.
Under head coach Dennis Emery, the Wildcats hold a 7-5 record this season. They opened conference play last weekend by beating Alabama, 4-3, and losing to Auburn, 5-2.
The Wildcats only list one player in individual rankings, With No. 68 Bruno Agostinelli.
The Tigers will be playing with heavy hearts this week as the Baton Rouge tennis community lost a faithful friend and fan this week as Dave Adler was killed in a tragic motorcycle accident. Adler was a regular at LSU men’s and women’s tennis matches for the past 15 years. Adler was well know for his enthusiasm and love for the sport.
Brown enjoyed Adler’s enthusiasm as an assistant coach and now as head coach.
“Since I have coached here, Dave has always supported our tennis program,” Brown commented. “We are going to miss the enthusiasm he brought to our matches and college tennis in general. He was well known around the college tennis world.”
One of Brown’s fondest memories of Adler was a match against Tulane in 2005. Adler was in his usual spirited form and was cheering the Tigers on when some of the Tulane players tried to copy his style by doing the same cheers to their teammates. After seeing his work duplicated, Adler replied by yelling “Often imitated but never duplicated!”
After Friday’s match against Kentucky, The Tigers host Vanderbilt on Sunday at noon.