Posted: Sep 25, 2019
SANTA CLARA, Calif. – Coming off an appearance in the West Coast Conference tournament finals last season, Santa Clara men's tennis opens the 2019-20 season on Friday at the Aggie Invitational in the first of four tournaments the Broncos will play this fall.
It is the fifth consecutive season Santa Clara is opening the fall slate at the Aggie Invitational, played at the Marya Welch Tennis Center in Davis, California.
The 2019 edition of the Broncos features a young squad comprised of four returnees and three freshmen after losing four seniors – Connor Garnett, Andrew Gu, Kamran Khan and Robert Seby - to graduation.
"We lost four very experienced players who were active in the lineup their entire four years so it'll be difficult to replace them. But I feel like we have a good spine as a team with two seniors who are natural leaders," said Broncos head coach Niall Angus in reference to Jesus Tapiador Barajas and Vasileios Iliopoulos.
Both Tapiador Barajas and Iliopoulos bring a wealth of experience being three-year starters.
Tapiador Barajas, a two-time All-WCC Honorable Mention selection in singles, finished last season with a 19-10 overall singles record and 10-13 in doubles. The Madrid, Spain native played the No. 1 and 2 singles positions during the dual match season.
Iliopoulos has come up big in the WCC tournaments, in addition to a stellar regular season, where he has been named to the All-Tournament team in each of his three seasons. Last season, Athens, Greece native finished with a 19-9 overall singles record and 16-14 in doubles.
Other returners include sophomores Santiago Hinojosa and Arthur Neuhaus.
In his first season, Neuhaus tied for the team-lead with 22 overall singles wins including a 12-6 record in the spring playing primarily in the No. 5 and 6 positions.
Hinojosa posted a 11-1 singles record last spring and tied for the team-lead with four conference singles wins.
"We also have a really good incoming freshmen class with a lot of talent," Angus said. "It's going to take a little time for them to get used to from the junior ranks to the collegiate ranks but they have the talent and work ethic."
A trio of freshmen will complement the returnees in Ryan Ali, Nick Cmager and Mann Shah, who will join the team for the dual match season.
"They are going to need to step in and fill out some of the spots in the lineup which have been held down for a long time. It's going to be up to them to prove themselves and to announce their presence in a collegiate lineup," said Angus.
The Aggie Invitational will run three days starting Friday.
Select players will travel to Tulsa, Oklahoma for the All-American Championships (Oct. 5-13), followed by the ITA Regional Championships (Oct. 25-29) at Stanford. The fall season wraps up at the Pacific Invitational in Stockton, California (Nov. 1–3).
