No. 15 Middle Tennessee Hits the Road to Take on Oklahoma State and No. 69 USF

MURFREESBORO, Tenn. – The 15th ranked Blue Raiders will travel to Stillwater, Okla. to serve up competition on Sunday, March 6 against Oklahoma State at 1:00 p.m. CT. Four days later, MT will head South and play No. 69 South Florida at 1:30 p.m. CT in Tampa, Fla.
 
Middle Tennessee (14-3, 1-0) is coming off one of the best weekends in program history. The Blue Raiders won the 74th Annual Blue Gray National Tennis Classic Championship after defeating No. 48 Tulane, No. 19 Arizona, and No. 29 Princeton. MT earned its highest rank in the Borendame era (No. 15 ITA and #23 Tennis Channel/USTA Top 25) after the performance.
 
Graduate Student Stepan Holis earned this weeks Conference USA Athlete of the Week after going 5-0 last weekend and clinching his first ranked win as a Blue Raider. Holis and Graduate Student doubles partner Chris Edge own a 13-1 record in doubles.
 
Edge has won 10 straight singles matches on court No. 3, including his first ranked win of the season over No. 71 Colton Smith of Arizona. At the Blue Gray, he surpassed 100 career singles wins and is five doubles wins shy of 100 in his career. Edge sits among the top three players in MT history in singles wins (101), singles winning percentage (.770), and combined wins (196).
 
No. 80 Stijn Slump went 2-1 on the Blue Raider top court last weekend, defeating No. 102 Jonas Ziverts in straight sets.
 
No. 115 Francisco Rocha went 2-0 at the Blue Gray Classic, in finished singles matches he has won seven-straight.
 
Coming in as the No. 23 duos pairing in the country, Rocha and Freshman Oskar Brostrom Poulsen have won 11 of their last 12 matches, five of those on the top court.
 
Senior Pavel Motl is in good form recently after recovering from a lingering shoulder injury that sidelined him near the beginning of the season, in finished singles matches he has won three in a row.
 
Oklahoma State has won five matches in a row coming into Sunday’s match. Last match Tyler Zink led the Cowboys on the top court, he is 3-3 on the season on court No. 1. The Cowboys load the bottom half of their singles lineup, Fran Pani is 10-0 overall on the season on court Nos. 5 and 6. Leighton Allen is 8-1 on court Nos. 4 and 5 on the season.
 
No. 69 South Florida has won three-straight ahead of next weeks’ match. Including a win over C-USA foe No. 65 Rice by a score of 4-1. The Bulls are led by Junior Chase Ferguson on court No. 1, he is 2-5 on the season on that court. Sergio Gomez Montesa has won eight-straight matches playing on court Nos. 3, 4, 5.
 
Match 18: No. 15 Middle Tennessee (14-3, 1-0 C-USA) at Oklahoma State (7-5, 0-0 Big 12)
– Stillwater, Okla.
– Sunday, March 6 – 1:00 p.m. CT
– Greenwood Tennis Center
 
Match 19: No. 15 Middle Tennessee (14-3, 1-0 C-USA) at No. 69 South Florida (5-5, 0-0 American)
– Tampa, Fla.
– Thursday, March 10 – 1:30 p.m. CT
– USF Varsity Tennis Courts
 
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