BATON ROUGE — The LSU men’s tennis team, fresh off a 4-3 victory over Auburn on Tuesday, moved up two spots to No. 8 in the Intercollegiate Tennis Association poll.
While the Tigers (17-3, 7-2 Southeastern Conference) jumped two spots in one poll, they fell two in another. LSU dropped to No. 7 in the Daily Tennis Coaches Poll from their previous position of fifth.
“We are moving in the right direction at the right time of the year,” said LSU coach Jeff Brown. Our goal at this point in the season is to host the first two rounds of the NCAA Tournament and we are in position to do that.”
Individually, three singles players were in the top 100 in the nation and one doubles team was in the top 50. Senior Tom Hand moved up to 19th after being outside the top 20 for over a month. Fellow seniors Michal Chmela and Ed Rubin also represented LSU in the rankings. Chmela jumped seven spots to No. 21 while Rubin made his first ever appearance in the poll at No. 100.
“Tom and Michal are once again working toward becoming All-Americans which comes with a top 20 ranking. And Ed’s contant improvement is finally paying off with this national ranking,” said Brown.
Chemla and Dan Kiernan fell in the national doubles rankings to 17th after holding a season-high position of 14th.