BATON ROUGE — The LSU men’s tennis team moved up five spots to No. 13 in the nation on Wednesday as the latest WingspanBank.com collegiate rankings were released by the Intercollegiate Tennis Association.
The Tigers’ significant jump in the rankings can be attributed to the team’s two-match winning streak against ranked opponents, and last week’s vital 4-3 victory over the 11th-ranked Ole Miss Rebels. LSU finished the regular season with an overall record of 14-6 and a 7-4 mark against Southeastern Conference opponents.
Georgia leads the SEC in the national rankings at the No. 2 position as all 12 of the conference’s teams finished the regular season ranked in the top 35. After second-ranked Georgia, the SEC teams in the national rankings are No. 7 Tennessee, No. 9 Ole Miss, No. 13 LSU, No. 17 Alabama, No. 20 Auburn, No. 22 Mississippi State, No. 24 Arkansas, No. 28 Kentucky, No. 29 Florida, No. 30 South Carolina, and the 33rd-ranked Vanderbilt Commodores.
LSU’s Ajay Ramaswami, also improved five spots in the national rankings on Wednesday, as the Tiger senior moved up to the No. 10 singles position. Ramaswami has compiled an impressive 25-13 overall record this season and an 11-7 mark in dual play at the No. 1 singles competition.
On Wednesday, Ramaswami was named to the All-SEC First Team for leading the Tigers to a third-place finish in the conference and by accumulating a 6-5 record against SEC opponents.
With the honor, Ramaswami extended LSU’s streak of having at least one player on the All-SEC First Team for the fourth-straight season.
Last season, Tiger seniors, Tom Hand and Michal Chmela, earned the honors.
It was the first time in history that two LSU players had been named to the All-SEC First Team.
The Tigers’ junior from Newcastle, England, Dan Kiernan, moved both up and down in the national rankings on Wednesday. In singles play, Kiernan improved from the No. 60 spot to being the 47th-ranked player in the nation. Unfortunately, LSU’s doubles combination comprised of Kiernan and freshman Sebastian Rutka dropped to No. 30 in the doubles rankings. The tandem had previously been the 25th-ranked team.
The SEC released its 2001 Academic Honor Roll on Wednesday and six Tigers earned the illustrious conference honors for their hard work in the classroom. Student athletes qualify for the award when they are at least a sophomore in classification and maintain a grade point average of 3.0 or better.
The Tigers honored as Academic All-SEC include senior Jonathan Hurd (natural science), junior Dan Kiernan (management), junior Anthony Mateljan (marketing), sophomore John Gray Pou (undecided), senior Ajay Ramaswami (international trade & finance), and John Sruk (accounting).
The LSU men’s tennis team will next be in action on Friday at 9 a.m., as the Tigers are scheduled to face either 17th-ranked Alabama or 29th-ranked Florida in the second round of the SEC tournament at the Hilary J. Boone Tennis Complex in Lexington, Ky. LSU is the third seed of the tournament and received a first-round bye. The Tigers have earned road victories over both Alabama and Florida this season during SEC play.