Feb. 7, 2008

Complete Release in PDF Format

Briefly
On the heels of their victory at Santa Clara, the Loyola Marymount men's tennis team travels to USC on Friday to face No. 33 University of Clemson in an 8:30 a.m. match. Saturday, the Lions return home to host Sacramento State in their first home match of the season at 11:00 a.m.

LMU This Season
The young Lions will be counting on their five returners for leadership this season. Coming back for LMU are seniors Sam Tadevosian and Jacek Twarowski, along with sophomores, Renzo Maggi, Dmitry Popov and Nick Von Der Ahe. In addition, first-year head coach Brad Sceney also welcomes four freshmen, Aris Andreasian (Glendale, CA), Johan Berhof (Kullavik, Sweden), Ivan Lopez (Almeria, Spain) and Stefan Nikolic (Belgrade, Serbia). "Our newcomers are going to have to be ready to perform straight away and I believe they are," Sceney said. "Also our sophomores are going to have to step up a notch from last year and be ready for plenty of playing time. Our team goal is to finish in the top-4 in the conference, last year we took 7th place." The Lions will have a tough go of it early on as they face nationally ranked programs in three of their first six matches. "We are currently unranked but we have every opportunity to achieve a national ranking with the schedule that we have," Sceney added. "We face two top-20 teams which will be a great test, and six other teams that are ranked, so the opportunities are there". LMU was to begin the season against No. 68 BYU and Pacific, but those matches had to be postponed to a later date due to weather conditions. The BYU match will now be played on Saturday Feb. 16 at 12:00 p.m. at the LMU Tennis Center. The Lions traveled to 75th-ranked Santa Clara (who are tied with San Diego in the ITA rankings) last weekend where they captured a 5-2 victory over the Broncos. This weekend, the Lions face No. 33 University of Clemson and Sacramento State before they hit the road again for matches at No. 75 San Diego and UC Santa Barbara, followed by matches at home against UC San Diego and WCC opponent San Francisco. Over the course of the spring 2008 season, the Lions will face a total of eight teams that appear in the national rankings.

Last Match Recap
The LMU men's tennis team opened their season at conference rival, No. 75 Santa Clara this past weekend. The 5-2 win was not only their first dual match win of the season, but also Brad Sceney's first win as head coach of the Lions. In singles, LMU's freshmen had a successful day with all three players taking the matches from their opponents. At the No. 3 slot, Ivan Lopez defeated Kenzo Hirakawa-Wong (6-1, 6-3), while teammates Johan Berhof stole the victory from Charlie Burke (6-1, 6-0) at the No. 5 position, and Stefan Nikolic beat Justin Wong in three sets, (6-2, 4-6, 6-0). Sophomore Renzo Maggi defeated Sentil Chidambaram (7-6, 6-3) at the No. 4 position, senior Jacek Twarowski was defeated at No. 1 by Jay Wong (4-6, 6-3, 2-6) in a thrilling three set match, while senior Sam Tadevosian lost at the No. 2 slot to Steven Benvenuto (4-6, 3-6). The Lions controlled doubles play, stealing victories from the Broncos at the No.1, 2 and 3 slots. Maggi and Tadevosian defeated Santa Clara's duo of Benvenuto/Wong, 8-6, Berhof and Twarowski won at No. 2 against Chidambaram/Hirakawa-Wong, 8-3, while Lopez and sophomore teammate Nick Von Der Ahe were victorious against Burke/Iwanski, 8-3. The win gives the Lions a 1-0 record as they head into their match against Clemson on Friday.

About #33 Clemson
On Sunday, the Clemson men's tennis team took on Austin Peay, defeating them 7-0. The 33rd-ranked Tigers are now 5-2 on the year. Clemson dominated the match, taking every point in both singles and doubles play. In singles, at the No. 1 position, Kevin Fleck defated Lucas DeBrito (6-4, 6-4), Ike Belk beat Leonardo Locatelli (6-4, 6-2), while Carlos Alvarez took the match in two sets from Patrick Puertolas (6-2, 6-1). At the No. 4 and 5 slots, Gera Boryachinskiy defeated Leandro Tolosa-Zenklusen (6-4, 6-0), Derek DiFazio beat Jay Wilkinson (6-4, 6-0), and Kevin Gallaway stole the victory from Darren Tallent (6-1, 6-0). The Tigers continued their dominate play in doubles with the Clemson duo of Boryachinskiy-Difazio beating Locatelli/Tolosa-Zenklusen, 9-7 at the No. 1 postion. At the 2 and 3 spots, Belk-Fleck defeated DeBrito-Puertolas, 8-4, and Alvarez-Gallaway took the match from Wilkinson-Tallent, 8-6, Chuck Kriese is in his 33rd year as head coach at Clemson.

About Sacramento State
In their last match, the Sacramento State men's tennis team won the top three singles matches en route to a 4-3 win over Oregon on Sat., Jan. 27. The Hornets improved to 2-0 on the season and won their second consecutive 4-3 match. The Sacramento State tandem of Anton Stryhas and Kiryl Harbatsiuk recorded the lone win for the Hornets with an 8-4 victory at No. 1 doubles. In singles play, Stryhas evened the match with an easy 6-0, 6-1, win over Alexander Cornelissen at No. 2. However, Oregon retook the lead with a 6-0, 6-0, victory at No. 6 by Stephen Wiechert over Ronan Conlon. The Ducks then posted their final point with a 6-2, 6-3, victory from Francisco Gallardo at No. 4. With their backs against the wall, the Hornets won the final three singles matches to secure the win. Artur Klimenka started the run at No. 3 with a 6-3, 7-5 win. Harbatsiuk followed with a 6-2, 6-4, victory at No. 1 over Marcos Verdasco to tie the match, 3-3. With the five previous singles matches ending in straight sets, all eyes turned to the No. 5 match. Oregon's Mike Myrhed took the first set 6-2 but Holden Ching rallied to tie the contest with a 7-5 win in the second set. The two players battled in the third frame and needed a tie-breaker after being tied 6-6. Ching ended the contest with a 7-2 victory in the tie-breaker to earn his first victory of the season. The Hornets are led by sophomore Anton Stryhas who was named the Big Sky Conference Men's Tennis Player of the Week for the week of Jan. 22-29. The honor is the first for Stryhas this season and the third of his career. Vyacheslav "Slava" Konikov enters his fifth year with the Sacramento State tennis program, and his third as the men's head coach.

Head Coach Brad Sceney
Sceney comes to the bluff after serving as the Director of Tennis at The Paseo Club in Valencia, CA., and enjoying an impressive collegiate career at Pepperdine from 1995-98. "We are excited to add Brad to our LMU family," LMU Athletic Director, Bill Husak said. "Brad has championship experience, both collegiately in the West Coast Conference, and professionally on the ATP Tour. We look forward to watching his leadership in action as he begins his work with our program." An All-American while at Pepperdine, Sceney helped the Waves to a top-10 ranking each of his four seasons in Malibu. His mark of 85 career singles victories is still the Pepperdine record today. In 1996, Sceney won the All-American Doubles Championship. Following his collegiate career, Sceney spent time in the professional tennis ranks, earning rankings in the top-600 in singles and top-300 in doubles after just one year on the ATP Tour. "I am excited to return to the collegiate athletics world," Sceney said. "LMU is a fantastic place to work and play, with a beautiful campus and great facilities that provide the basis for a top tennis program. I look forward to working toward that end with the team and staff." Sceney, a native of Australia, won the 1992 Australian Open Junior Doubles Championship. He was the second-ranked junior in Australia from 1986-1992 and was a member of the country's junior national team. For the last nine years, Sceney has worked with Topseed Tennis Academy, a corporation that owns and operates three tennis clubs and one sports club in Southern California. Hired as a tennis instructor in 1999, Sceney advanced to the title of Director of Tennis at one of the company's sites, The Paseo Club in Valencia, CA. There, he manages a staff of 10 tennis professionals and coordinates the tennis program for approximately 3,500 members.

Lions Spotlight: Sophomore Renzo Maggi
Renzo Maggi is in his second season with LMU tennis. In his first match of the 2007-08 season against 75th-ranked Santa Clara, Maggi and teammate Sam Tadevosian defeated the Bronco's Jay Wong and Steve Bevenuto, 8-6 at No. 1 doubles. He also won a crucial match for LMU at No. 4 singles, defeating Senthil Chidambaram, 7-6 , 6-2. His singles match was the nail in the coffin that gave the Lions the victory over conference rival Santa Clara, and a 1-0 record to start the season. Last season at LMU, the Rossmoor, CA native posted a doubles record of 15-11 as a freshman, while going 7-12 in singles, and 3-0 the No. 5 spot. A 2006 graduate of Los Alamitos High School in Los Alamitos, CA, Maggi also attended Palmetto High School in Miami, FL. from 2002-2003. A two-sport athlete, he earend a combined six letters in tennis and basketball, and served as captain of both teams his senior season. He was ranked as high as first in doubles and No. 2 in singles as a junior player in Florida, qualified for the third round at the prestigious Orange Bowl, and was a doubles finalist at a national open held in Oakland, CA. Maggi also helped Los Alamitos High School to the CIF Championship in basketball. Renzo Antonio Maggi was born March 5, 1988 in Long Beach, CA. He is the son of Bettina Dibos and Daniel Spatz and Carlos and Ann Maggi. A communications studies major, Maggi has five brothers, Flavio, Carlos, Alec, Marco, and Daniel.