The University of Wisconsin men’s tennis team (12–10, 4–5 Big Ten) will travel on the road this weekend to play No. 8 Illinois (17–6, 8–1 Big Ten) and Northwestern (9–14, 4–5 Big Ten) in their final set of games before the Big Ten Tournament.
Since all 12 teams in the conference make the tournament and Wisconsin can no longer earn a bye, the Badgers will just be competing for seeding this weekend.
Much like the Wisconsin weather, the Badgers have been ice cold record-wise in April losing their first four matches before taking down Michigan State by a score of 6-1 last week.
But Wisconsin took on some difficult opponents in that stretch facing both No. 2 Ohio State and No. 12 Michigan. Also, most of these decisions were close as three of the Badgers’ four losses were within one match of either tying the score or winning.
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Chema Carranza and Josef Dodridge will look to continue their dominant play in doubles matches this year. The team has won nine straight decisions and is 25–3 on the year, though four of their past five matches have gone unfinished.
Also stepping up in the doubles game for the Badgers recently are the duos of Daniel Soyfer and Osgar O’Hoisin as well as Lamar Remy and Chase Colton, both winning their matches against Michigan State to secure the doubles point.
Carranza has also been hot in singles, notching wins in his past four matches for a 19–12 overall record.
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On Illinois, Alex Brown and Caleb Chakravarthi will counter Wisconsin’s doubles attack with an 18–12 overall record this year. Brown’s singles play has been impressive of late as well, notching five straight with a 7–2 record in his last nine decisions.
But fighting Illinois’s No. 1 singles player all year has been Aleks Vukic, who maintains a 10–5 record in singles matches all coming from the first slot.
Next against Northwestern Dominik Stary and Ben Vandixhorn will be the No. 1 doubles duo for the team with an 11–16 overall record on the year.
Stary is also the team’s best singles player, going 14–11 overall on the year and 6–6 from the No. 1 slot.
Opening serve against Illinois will be 3 p.m. Friday in Urbana and at noon versus Northwestern on Sunday in Evanston.
