No. 70 Men's Tennis Heads To HEB Tournament

LAFAYETTE – After receiving their first national ranking since 2015, the No. 70 Louisiana Ragin' Cajuns men's tennis team takes their show on the road as this weekend they head to the 52nd Annual HEB Tournament of Champions to be held in Corpus Christi, Texas starting on Friday, Mar. 2 and wrapping up on Saturday, Mar. 3.

WHO'S ALL THERE: Louisiana will be joined by the hosting No. 65 Texas A&M-Corpus Christi Islanders, UT-Rio Grande Valley Broncs, DePaul Blue Demons, UTSA Roadrunners, New Mexico State Aggies and two Sun Belt Conference opponents with the Troy Trojans and South Alabama Jaguars making the trip.

NATIONALLY RANKED AND IT FEELS JUST RIGHT: Off to their best start since their 2014 Sun Belt Conference championship season, the Cajuns received a No. 70 national ranking this past week. It was the first time they've been ranked since 2015, and it's a testament to the tough wins earned by the team individually and as a whole. It makes them only the second team in the SBC to earn a national ranking this season, as they join the No. 45 Georgia State Panthers.

The Cajuns have taken down three defending conference champions, and senior Vlad Kramarov and sophomore Elio Lago took down Old Dominion's then nationally ranked No. 22 doubles pair, to show that the Cajuns are for real this season.

CAJUNS ENTER AS NO. 2 SEEDED: It's the seventh straight season that the Cajuns have taken part in the HEB Tournament, and Louisiana enters the tournament as the number two seeded team and they'll open up things with a rematch against UTSA on Friday, Mar. 2 with that match scheduled for 10 a.m. From there they'll face the winner of the DePaul and New Mexico State matchup which will be contested at the same time as the Cajuns match.

No matter the outcome of the first match Louisiana's second match of the tournament will be contested later that day at 5 p.m. On Saturday, Mar. 3 there will be four matches contested, with the third place, fifth place and seventh place matches all starting at 9 a.m. The championship match will take place at 12:30 p.m. on Saturday to wrap up the weekend's event.

UTSA IS A FAMILIAR FOE: Louisiana's first match is a rematch against the UTSA Roadrunners and UTSA enters the weekend at 5-5 and they won their previous three matches, beating Prairie View A&M in a doubleheader and Incarnate Word on Sunday, Feb. 25. This is of course the second time the two teams have met with the Cajuns holding off UTSA on Feb. 2, in San Antonio, Texas, to win 4-3 thanks to Kramarov's three-set clinching battle at No. 3.

IT COULD BE ONE OR THE OTHER: New Mexico State enters the weekend sitting at 6-3, and they're bringing a three-match winning streak into their matchup with DePaul. New Mexico State's last win was against the SBC's UT-Arlington, 4-3, on Sunday, Feb. 18 at home. Louisiana and New Mexico State met in the HEB Tournament of Champions last season, where the Cajuns dropped the match their match against the Aggies.

DePaul enters the weekend sitting at 10-3 as they're off to a solid start. They've won five of their last six matches, including their previous four matches, to come into the weekend on a roll as they'll face off with the Aggies in the first round. Louisiana and the Blue Demons faced off in the first round of this same tournament with the Cajuns taking the first-round matchup, 4-1, to move into the second round.

FOLLOWING THE RAGIN' CAJUNS: Follow the Cajuns on twitter (@RaginCajunsMT), Instagram (ragincajunsMT) and snapchat (ragincajunsmt) to stay up to date with the team as they travel to Texas this weekend. Links to recaps on RaginCajuns.com following each day's action can be found on twitter along with any updates on how the day is going for the Cajuns.

#GEAUXCAJUNS

No. 70 Men's Tennis Heads To HEB Tournament

Next Event

Players Mentioned

Vlad Kramarov

Elio Lago

Footer

University of Louisiana at Lafayette Athletics