A seasoned UIC tennis team will begin its regular season Sunday, eager to show that it has made the transition from youthful to experienced and contend for a conference title.
Three seniors and four juniors return from last season's group, which earned the #5 seed in the Horizon League tournament and bowed out in the first round. Those seven players have each been in the lineup since the day they arrived on campus, taking some lumps along the way but using every match as a building block for future success.
Head coach
Hans Neufeld is eager to see what his veterans can do. "We return everybody but one player from last year," he said. "Those guys are developing into solid players, as I always expected them to do. They were thrown into the fire as freshman; now they need to start throwing fire."
The senior class, consisting of
Alvaro de la Fuente,
Marcelo Dib, and
Piotr Lada, will try to lead the Flames to their first postseason win since 2015. De la Fuente got off to a strong start in tournament play last fall, going undefeated at the River Forest Collegiate Invitational in his singles and doubles draws. Lada earned two singles wins at the event. Dib, sidelined for the fall due to injury, is expected to return this spring. He has a chance to finish his career among UIC's all-time winningest doubles players.
Juniors
Johan Hedstrom,
Kailash Panchapakesan,
William Wale, and
Niko Wasilewicz form the rest of the core of the veteran squad. Wale, Hedstrom, and Wasilewicz all qualified for ITA Regionals in October, where the latter two each earned a singles victory and Hedstrom and Wale teamed up to get a doubles win. "Johan made a big leap last year," Neufeld observed. "He and William competed well in the fall as a doubles team. I have to find the right pairing for Niko until Marcelo gets back."
Junior transfer
Kasper Parlklo, and freshmen
Anthony Nguyen and
Pelle Strandberg are the three newcomers to the team. Strandberg advanced to the championship match of the #3 singles draw at River Forest, and all three fresh faces qualified for ITA Regionals in singles and doubles. Nguyen and Strandberg each picked up a singles win at the competitive event. Their performances so impressed Neufeld that he "anticipate[s] having all three newcomers in the starting lineup" on Sunday.
UIC will face two defending conference champions to begin the season. MAC winner Western Michigan will host the Flames for a doubleheader Sunday, and Big East champ Marquette is next on the docket January 26. Local rivals Chicago State, DePaul, and Northwestern, along with nearby Eastern Illinois and Illinois State, dot the non-conference schedule. When Detroit Mercy announced that they will not sponsor a team this season, Neufeld scheduled Dayton to fill their slot.
Neufeld wanted to challenge his team out of the gate. "WMU is the perennial winner of the MAC. They will give us a good push and exploit any of our weaknesses. Playing the doubleheader lets us put out two separate lineups," he explained. "We have been adjusting the lineup in practice to find the best slot for everyone.
"In DePaul and Marquette we will be facing the top two programs in the Big East. Northwestern is always tough. Dayton will be good competition for us. We'll be playing a lot of road matches pre-conference, which will set us up for being comfortable on the road."
That comfort will prove invaluable during Horizon League play, which will send the Flames on the road for five of their six conference matches. The top six teams will qualify for the conference tournament, which begins April 26 in West Lafayette, Indiana. "With as deep as our league is, Horizon League competition is tough every time you step onto the court. Still, I think we could have done better than fifth last year," Neufeld said.
"I'm looking forward to this year. The guys have been working hard."
