Fall Tennis Season Begins With Tournaments in Vegas, San Francisco
TEMPE — Sun Devil Men's Tennis kicks off the 2021-22 season this week with a pair of west-coast tournaments. Part of ASU's squad will be in action Thursday-Sunday competing in San Francisco's Battle in the Bay Classic, while a trio of others will compete at UNLV's Larry Easley Memorial Classic Friday-Sunday.
Battle in the Bay draws
Participating teams in Vegas include UNLV, Gonzaga, Cal Poly, San Diego State and Grand Canyon. Limited information for the Battle in the Bay has been released, but live results and streaming links will be shared once available.
Senior transfer Fabiel Salle and freshman Nicola Cigna will take on competition in the Bay at the California Tennis Club, while Spencer Brachman, Moritz Hoffmann and Jonah Wilson will travel to Las Vegas and compete at the Fertitta Tennis Complex.
Salle, a transfer from Louisville, opens the fall season ranked at No. 52 in the ITA preseason top-125 singles rankings. Cigna will make his debut for the Maroon and Gold this weekend, and is one of Italy's top talents, collecting 35 victories in his junior career.
Last season, ASU peaked No. 17 before finishing the year at 20th in the ITA/Oracle rankings and held a record of 17-9. ASU recorded a notable win over No. 23 Stanford to punch their ticket to the Pac-12 Championship title match for the first time in program history where they fell to No. 15 USC. The Sun Devils then advanced to the second round of the NCAA Championships, falling in the second round to TCU. The Sun Devils also celebrated Nathan Ponwith's run in the NCAA Singles Championship.
Additional returners for the Sun Devils are Max McKennon, George Stoupe and Christian Lerby. During his sophomore campaign, Lerby went 12-8 in singles and 12-8 in doubles. Stoupe saw time across the bottom three singles courts, picking up 11 total wins. He kicked off the 2021 season 8-1 and went 13-9 in doubles. McKennon, a sophomore from California, clinched ASU's Pac-12 Tournament second-round victory over Stanford. New additions to the team include Texas transfer Jacob Bullard, redshirt freshman Filipe Costa and freshman Murphy Cassone.