Buckeyes go 0-4 in opening round of Columbus Challenger

Four current Ohio State Buckeyes competed at the Columbus Challenger professional tennis tournament this week.

The Columbus Challenger is taking place at the Ohio State University this week. As I’ve explained before, the Columbus Challenger series is an excellent opportunity, both for American tennis players in general, Ohio State’s tennis program, and tennis fans around Columbus.

Ohio State hosts multiple Challenger Tour events throughout the year. The Challenger Tour is the second-highest professional men’s tennis tour, right below the ATP World Tour. Challenger tournaments are usually filled by players ranked from 100-400 in the world. Ohio State uses the Challengers in Columbus to increase fan interest, to help with recruiting, and to give current (and former) Buckeyes the chance to compete against some of the best in the world.

Four current members of the Men’s Tennis team were given entry to the Challenger. Unfortunately for them, none managed to advance to the second round this time. However, all of them performed admirably against some of the top opponents–certainly a higher-caliber opponent than you’ll see in most college matchups.

John McNally, likely the most pro-ready Buckeye, took World No. 275 Roberto Quiroz to two tiebreaks. However, the Cincinnati couldn’t win either of them, so he lost 7-6 7-6. Freshman phenom Cannon Kingsley also took Lloyd Glasspool to a first-set tiebreak, but Kingsley lost the tiebreak and the second set as well. Redshirt freshman Andrew Lutschaunig was given a qualifying spot, and he had to take on World No. 208 Zhe Li. Lutschaunig was also able to force a first-set tiebreak, but he lost it and the second set as well. This morning, Justin Boulais fell to World No. 270 Guilherme Clezar in straight sets as well.

So while current Buckeyes might not have won a single set against their four opponents, they all played tough and impressed against top-caliber competition. They might not have earned any ranking points and I’m sure all would have loved to have advanced, but this is a great experience and they played really well.

Former Buckeyes J.J. Wolf and Mikael Torpegaard–each former champions of Columbus Challengers–received first-round byes and are still in the tournament. Wolf begins his tournament today (Tuesday) against World No. 273 James Ward, while Torpegaard begins tomorrow.

Ohio State Men’s Tennis continues march to top with win over No. 1 USC

The Ohio State Buckeyes men’s tennis team upset the No. 1 USC Trojans in Columbus on Sunday.

A week after taking out then-No. 1 Texas, the Ohio State Men’s Tennis team took down another No. 1 team in the nation–the USC Trojans.

The Trojans stayed at No. 1 for a good reason–they are a rare team that has six nationally-ranked players. That is a very tough matchup for any team to beat. Even Ohio State last season–when the Buckeyes were a prohibitive No. 1 for most of the season–didn’t have six ranked players. The lowest-ranked player for USC is No. 69 Ryder Jackson, while No. 1 Daniel Cukierman leads the squad.

Ohio State wasn’t daunted by this matchup, and the Buckeyes had a great home crowd behind them. The Buckeyes took the doubles point with a 6-4 win on Court 3 and a tiebreak win on Court 2, while Ohio State’s No. 1 pair of John McNally and Robert McNally didn’t finish their set, as the Buckeyes claimed the point while that court was still in a tiebreaker.

Still, the Buckeyes needed to win three of the six singles matches, all against ranked players. McNally–whose sister Caty is making waves on the professional tour, especially with partner CoCo Gauff in doubles–took down No. 24 Brandon Holt in straight sets. The huge win was on Court 2, though, where rising star freshman Cannon Kingsley took down No. 1 Cukierman in two easy sets. USC won their matches on Courts 3 and 4, and they forced third sets on the other two. However, Buckeye sophomore James Trotter ran away with his third set against No. 65 Stefan Dostanic, and the Buckeyes took home the victory.

The Buckeyes next face No. 7 Texas A&M on Tuesday evening, again in Columbus. After that, it will be the ITA National Indoors Championships–where Ohio State enters as defending champions.

It’s been a tough road back to the top for Ohio State, after a quarterfinal loss in the NCAA tournament and the graduation of J.J. Wolf. Still, the Buckeyes should be right at No. 1 when the rankings update again, and this time the Buckeyes will want to hold on to that even deeper into the NCAAs.