Cowboys Host Pair Of Top-25 Foes

Notes vs. Wake Forest & Minnesota

The Basics
The No. 28-ranked Oklahoma State men's tennis squad will host a pair of top-25 teams this weekend at the Greenwood Tennis Center in Stillwater, Oklahoma. On Friday, the Pokes take on the No. 11-ranked Demon Deacons of Wake Forest at 6 p.m. Following that match, Oklahoma State goes head-to-head with No. 22-ranked Minnesota on Sunday at noon.

Follow the Match Live
Thanks to Playsight smart court technology, each match at the Greenwood Tennis Center will be live streaming on playsight.com. Click the live tab on top of the home page and scroll down until you spot the Oklahoma State University video link.
Also, live stats for all matches this weekend can be found on the men's tennis page at okstate.com. Live updates will be available on the Oklahoma State men's tennis Twitter page (@CowboyTennis).

In the ITA Rankings
The Cowboys jumped three spots into the top-25 in the latest Oracle/ITA Rankings after an impressive showing at the ITA Kick-Off this past weekend. Wake Forest remained at No. 11 in the rankings, while Minnesota also stayed put at No. 22.

Three Pokes start the season with a spot in the singles rankings, as All-Americans Julian Cash and Arjun Kadhe are No. 68 and No. 112. Junior Jurence Mendoza was ranked in singles for the first time in his Cowboy career at No. 85. Wake Forest has three players in the singles rankings, as Skander Mansouri leads them at No. 26 with teammates Johnathan Ho and Maksim Kan at No. 103 and No. 110. Ruben Weber and Felix Corwin are the two lone Golden Gophers in the singles rankings at No. 95 and No. 101.

The doubles rankings feature a trio Cowboy duos, highlighted by All-American duo Kadhe/Cash at No. 9. OSU tandems Lukas Finzelberg/Mendoza and Tristan Meraut/Nathan Roper round out the doubles rankings at No. 53 and No. 56. Three Wake Forest duos are in the doubles rankings with two of them being in the top-30 (No. 25 Mansouri/Christian Seraphim and No. 27 Kan/Romain Bogaerts). The other duo for Wake Forest is at No. 57 featuring Ho/Keivon Tabrizi. Minnesota has a top-20 duo coming to town in No. 20 Matic Spec/Corwin.

Coach Udwadia Records 200th Career Victory
Last Saturday's victory against No. 32 Harvard was a special one for Cowboy head coach Jay Udwadia as he collected his 200th career win. Udwadia becomes only the second coach in Cowboy history to record his 200th win with OSU, the only other coach was Cowboy legend James Wadley.

Entering OSU, Udwadia had 145 career wins with stops at Drake and Fresno State where he turned both programs into yearly conference title contenders. At Fresno State, Udwadia reached the conference finals six of his eight years and won the title in 2011 and 2012.

The New York-native is also only the second coach in Cowboy Tennis history to collect more than 50 wins in his first three seasons, as he won 51 games before entering this season.

After back-to-back NCAA Second Round appearances, the future looks bright for coach Udwadia and the Oklahoma State men's tennis program.

Cowboys Home Court Advantage
Since being opened in 2014, the Michael and Anne Greenwood Tennis Center has been a tremendous home court advantage for Oklahoma State men's tennis.

In two years, the Cowboys have won 23 of their 29 home matches, including five wins over teams ranked in the ITA top-60 in 2015.

The Pokes will look to continue their home success this season as they host 13 matches this season, with eight of them coming against teams ranked in the top-50.

Cowboys vs. Opponents
The 2016 match between the Demon Deacons and the Pokes will be for the series lead as the two schools have series record of 2-2. After winning the first two meetings in 1981 and 2005, Oklahoma State has dropped the last couple meetings against Wake Forest, including last year's meeting in Winston-Salem, North Carolina where the Demon Deacons held on in a thriller to win, 4-3.

Oklahoma State and Minnesota will also be playing for the all-time series lead in 2016. The Golden Gophers have won four of the last six in the series. Last time the Cowboys beat Minnesota was back in 2014 at the newly built Greenwood Tennis Center.

OSU's Gerch and Ismailov Becoming Elite Tandem
Lucas Gerch and Temur Ismailov have developed quickly into one of the best doubles teams in the country. In their first four matches playing together, the Cowboy duo has only surrendered one or two games in three of the matches.

Their most impressive win so far came this past weekend against No. 32 Harvard, as they defeated the No. 32-ranked doubles team in the country to clinch to the doubles point against the Crimson and gave the Pokes some momentum heading into singles play.

After a hot start, Ismailov and Gerch will face their biggest challenges yet with No. 11 Wake Forest and No. 22 Minnesota coming to Stillwater this weekend.

Cowboys Shutout Four Consecutive Opponents to Start Spring
The smell of spring has brought out the best in the Cowboy Tennis squad as they shutout their first four opponents of the season, including No. 32 Harvard and No. 45 Memphis.

This marks the first time the Cowboys had four consecutive shutouts in a season, since back in 2014 when they had five straight.

In the four wins, they defeated both UNLV and Creighton 7-0, while beating back-to-back ranked opponents Harvard and Memphis on the road, 4-0.

With four shutouts already this season, you can expect more from the Cowboys as they have averaged around seven shutouts in the past three seasons.

Former Cowboy Becomes Assistant Coach
Three-time All-American Jakob Sude was named an Undergraduate Student Assistant Coach by coach Jay Udwadia this season. After finishing his final year of eligibility last season, Sude looks to use the experience he gained while playing tennis at OSU.

As a Cowboy, the All-American was the consistent No. 1 for the Pokes, as he helped lead the Pokes to 39 victories over the past two seasons. In 2015, he won 14 singles matches, including a victory against the No. 1 player in the ITA Rankings, Soren Hess-Olsen, of Texas, 6-4, 6-2. Sude was also the first Cowboy since 2010 to earn All-American status in singles play, as the Cowboy made it all the way to the Round of 16 at the NCAA Singles Championships.

Big 12 Strongest in the Nation
The Big 12 conference features some of the most talented players in the nation, with all six teams in the conference being ranked in the ITA top-30. Oklahoma is the highest ranked team at No. 2, TCU and Baylor follow them at No. 3 and 5. The Red Raiders sit at No. 14, as the Longhorns and Pokes aren't too far behind them at No. 26 and No. 25.

The only other conference with as many teams in the ITA top-30 is the ACC and SEC with six teams as well. The Big Ten has five teams in the top-30 and the Pac-12 features four teams.

Straight Cash Homie!
All-American and Mississippi State-transfer Julian Cash has made his mark in his short time as a Cowboy. The sophomore finished the fall season with eight wins in singles and 11 wins in doubles with partner Arjun Kadhe.

At the ITA Central Regional, Cash became the first Cowboy since 2009 to advance to both the singles and doubles final. The All-American won five straight singles matches at the tournament before falling to No. 50 Alexandru Ghilea in the singles final.

In doubles, the All-American tandem featuring Cash/Kadhe was a force to be reckoned with in the fall, as they won the back draw title at the ITA All-American Championships in Tulsa, Oklahoma. The Cowboy duo defeated No. 5-ranked Christian Seraphim/Skander Mansouri of Wake Forest in the semifinals.

This past weekend, Cash was named the Big 12 Men's Tennis Player of the Week. The English-native beat the No. 24-ranked player in the country at the ITA Kick-Off, hosted by TCU.

Kadhe Looks For Third-Straight All-American Season
Last season, Kadhe and his former doubles partner Jakob Sude were the first Cowboy doubles team in Oklahoma State history to earn back-to-back All-American honors.

Kadhe looks to become only the third Cowboy in Oklahoma State history to earn three All-American honors. The only other Cowboys to have three All-American honors are Oleksandr Nedovyesov (2008-2010) and Sude (2014-15).

He will have a good chance at completing the task, as Kadhe and his new doubles partner Julian Cash have already developed great chemistry together by winning the back draw at the ITA All-American Championship and finishing runner-up in the doubles main draw at the ITA Central Regional during the fall season.

Follow Cowboy Tennis
Stay up to date with the Oklahoma State men's tennis team on the following social media sites:
   Twitter: @CowboyTennis
   Instagram: @CowboyTennis
   Facebook: Oklahoma State Cowboy Tennis
   Snapchat: OSUathletics
   YouTube: youtube.com/osuathletics

Next Event

Players Mentioned

Julian Cash

Lukas Finzelberg

Lucas Gerch

Temur Ismailov

Arjun Kadhe

Jurence Mendoza

Tristan Meraut

Nathan Roper

Jakob Sude

Oklahoma State University Athletics