The men’s tennis season may be a few months away, but U coach F.D. Robbins has quite a task on his hands.
While the Utes ended the 2003 regular season on a high note, it was hardly a banner year for the team.
The Utes finished the regular season on a three-game winning streak, shutting out Portland State, Weber State and Montana to go into the Mountain West Tournament with a load of momentum.
But despite its late-season push, the team still finished the regular season at just 11-13. The Utes dropped their opening-round meeting with Air Force 4-3 before going on to defeat UNLV the following day to clinch a fifth place finish within the conference.
As if they weren’t struggling enough already, Utah now has the daunting task of replacing half of its roster before the coming season.
Kaisorn Chaichana, a Verizon Academic All-American last season, and Tyler Poulson both graduated, while Daniel Lohff, who still had two years of eligibility remaining, decided to transfer.
As far as the remaining players go, Robbins says he believes he has a strong talent core that could lead to some improvement next spring. Canadian imports Tomasz Grzyb and Nick Coutts both performed fairly well as freshmen last season and, with a bit of experience under their belts, are expected to step up even bigger in 2004.
Also returning is Roeland Brateanu who, as a senior, will be expected to provide some leadership ability to what will be a considerably young squad.
Brateanu and Grzyb, as well as walk-on sophomore Michael Bullard, were Academic All MWC selections this past spring.
Academically, the men’s tennis team is one of the strongest athletic teams on the U campus.
The team was recently recognized as an All-Academic Team by the Intercollegiate Tennis Association, as four team members-Chaichana, Poulson, Bullard and Grzyb-were named Scholar Athletes. As a whole, the Utes came through with a 3.2 cumulative GPA last season as they were honored by the ITA for the fourth time.
Robbins is looking to replace the talent he’s losing as quickly as possible. While very little is official as of yet, the team does expect to have several valuable additions for the 2004 season, including Brateanu’s younger brother.
While the team’s offseason losses may put a bit of a damper on things, Robbins is still optimistic that the Utes won’t struggle as mightily as they did at times last season-in part because of the rising maturity of Grzyb and Coutts, and because of the enthusiasm surrounding the team’s recruiting class.
“We will rely heavily on Roeland and Coutts and Tomasz, and the experience that they had last year,” Robbins said, while remaining positive about the freshmen. “[But] we are really excited about the new guys. If we get [all the recruits] through the clearing house, we will have a much better team than last year.”
The team is also obviously concerned about Lohff’s unexpected departure.
“Yes, it hurts to lose him,” Robbins said. “Of course you miss anyone you spent a couple of years working on. But if he is looking for a different place to go, and he doesn’t really want to be here, then it is probably better for the team.”
All in all, there is an ocean of uncertainty surrounding the U men’s tennis team, and while the team’s incoming class could potentially be a solid building block for the rest of the program, there are a lot of questions that remain unanswered.
“We have a lot of talent,” Robbins said. “As soon as we get matches underway, we will have a good team.”
Asad Kudiya contributed to this article.