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Men's Tennis Archive

NCAA National Champions
1989, 1995, 1996, 1998, 2005

May 17, 2004
Matt Seeburger Wins NCAA Title

MEN'S TENNIS SINGLES NCAA FINALS WINNER: Matt Seeberger receives trophy. (Photo by Aaron Todd of Bates College.)

LEWISTON, ME -- UC Santa Cruz's Matt Seeberger won the NCAA Division III Men's Tennis singles title, and Mary Washington's Dan Uyar and Paul Bristow captured the doubles title at Bates College's Wallach Tennis Center on Monday.

Seeberger, the tournament's fourth seed, defeated John Michael Cham-A-Koon of Claremont Mudd-Scripps 6-1, 6-4 in the championship match in the morning. He broke Cham-A-Koon's serve twice early on to build a 3-0 lead before coasting to a win in the first set, then battled back from a 3-0 deficit to prevail in the second set.

    See related newsletter Slug Tennis Update Final 2004...
See Singles Bracket Results...
See Doubles Bracket Results...
  ==> See full article at Bates College online.

April 26, 2004
Ojai Proves Successful for Tennis Team

WINNER OF 104TH OJAI TENNIS TOURNAMENT: Matt Seeberger, a first in Slug freshman history.

OJAI, CA -- Freshman phenom Matt Seeberger added some bragging rights to his already impressive Slug rookie year this weekend by winning the 104th Ojai Valley Tennis Tournament. He is the first Slug to win the tournament as a freshman.

Seeberger, the Slugs' No. 2 singles player who heralds from Redwood City, defeated UCSC's No. 3 Kevin Casey 4-6, 6-1, 6-0 in the semifinals. In the finals, he defeated Slug senior Brian Casey, the Slugs' No. 1 singles player, 6- 4, 6-1. The Casey brothers, from Mount Shasta, are nationally ranked Nos. 6 and 11, respectively. "I think Matt showed he can crank down and play when the pressure is on," coach Bob Hansen said.

Seeberger and Brian Casey were not the only Slugs to shine at Ojai -- the UCSC team dominated singles competition, winning 16 matches against opponents from other schools and losing only five. Unranked Slug junior Bryce Parmelly, who usually does not start at singles, defeated 14th-ranked Brian Murphy of Redlands, 6-7, 6-4, 6-1.

"I think it showed that we're hitting our stride when it counts," Hansen said.

The Slugs narrowly missed a victory in doubles, as the Casey brothers were defeated 6-3, 7-6 (6) by Cham-a-Koon and sophomore Kyle Ellison.

For the Slugs, the tournament is a preview of the what they will face at next week's regional tournament, which features the same teams. The winner of the tournament qualifies for the NCAA Division III national tournament at Bates College in Lewiston, Maine.
  ==> See full article in the Santa Cruz Sentinel.
     See related newsletter Slugs Rock at Ojai...
See Bracket Results...

April 20 , 2004
Slugs Rank #3 Nationally, Win Ten Victories in a Row

RANKED #10 IN SINGLES: Junior returner Kevin Casey, up from preseason #11.

SKILLMAN, NJ -- Preseason polls had ranked UC Santa Cruz Men's Tennis 5th in the country and the #1 team in the West Region. As of April 16, Men's Tennis has moved up to 3rd nationally in the ITA Rankings. The team is now #2 in the West Region.

This year's squad is headed by a talented group of highly ranked players. In West Region doubles, Matt Brunner with Kellen Ali-Christie ranked #5, and Matt Seeberger with Shane Templeman ranked #10. In West Region singles, Brian Casey ranked #1, Matt Seeberger at #6, Shane Templeman at #9, Kevin Casey at #10, and Andrew Cohen at #21. The Slugs smashed 10 more teams in a row, vs.: Linfield, Occidental, Middlebury, La Verne, Chapman, Southwestern (TX), San Diego, UC Davis, Northern Arizona, and Cal Poly.

    See Full DIII ITA Rankings (4-16-2004)

March 23, 2004
Slugs Win Eight Victories in a Row:
The Trend Continues

SANTA CRUZ, CA -- The UCSC Men's Tennis Team took a perfect record into the ITA National Indoor Team Championships in late February, an event they won in 2001. After easily beating Bates College 7-0 in the first round, the Slugs were handed their first defeat of the year by host team and defending champ Gustavus Adolphus. However, the team rebounded in beating regional rival Trinity College, earning the Slugs 3rd place at Indoor Nationals.

The Men's team next faced 11th-ranked Redlands at home in a back and forth match until All-American Brian Casey sealed the victory for the Slugs in the last singles match of the day. Continuing a three-week homestand, the Slugs notched up wins against Pomona Pitzer and University of Rochester in early March. Then came a much awaited contest at home against East Coast tennis power Swarthmore. It didn't turn out to be much of a contest, the Slugs routed Swarthmore 7-0! UCSC ran its season record to 10-2 with a 7-0 victory over Gonzaga last weekend at the East Field House. In singles, the Slugs won all six matches without the loss of a single set! That included sophomore Shane Templeman, who is undefeated for the year in singles competition.

    ITA National Indoors...
    vs. Redlands...
    vs. Swarthmore...
    vs. Gonzaga...
    vs. Univ of South & Cal Lu...

February 8, 2004
Slugs Dominate With Early Season Victories

STOCKTON & SANTA CRUZ, CA -- It was a great weekend for Slug tennis! On Sunday February 8th we were able to play both our first and second teams against Univ of Pacific in Stockton and Dominican College at home.  Against a very good UOP team, which is currently ranked 70th in the country Div l, we had a dog fight from the beginning to the end.  At three doubles we got a great effort again from Shane Templeman and Matt Seeberger who won 8-4.  Matt is returning agressively and consistently and Shane is continuing to be more aggressive at the net.  With both players serving well they are quite dominant.  We were up early at one doubles with Matt Brunner and Kellen Ali-Christie serving well and returning solidly.  As the match progressed we lost composure and started pressing eventually falling 8-6.  At this point we were down 4-6 with the UOP team serving at 40-0 at number 2 doubles.  Early jitters led to some tight play early but Brian Casey and Bryce Parmelly played the end of the set beautifully to come back and win 9-7 giving the Slugs the doubles point.
    ==> more...

January 17, 2004
Slugs Tough in Singles Matches

UC Santa Cruz 3, Santa Clara 4

SINGLES
1. Gernot Fischer (SCU) def. Matt Brunner (UCSC) - 6-3, 6-2
2. Matt Seeberger (UCSC) def. Erich Chen (SCU) - 4-6, 6-1, 6-4
3. Kevin Casey (UCSC) def. Eric Kochanski (SCU) - 4-6, 6-2, 6-2
4. Taylor Bedilion (SCU) def. Brian Casey (UCSC) - 6-3, 6-0
5. Francisco Zepponi (SCU) def. Andrew Cohen (UCSC) - 6-4, 7-6 (3)
6. Shane Templeman (UCSC) def. Kevin McQuaid (SCU) - 0-6, 7-5, 6-1

DOUBLES
1. Fischer/Kochanski (SCU) def. Brunner/ Kellen Ali-Christe (UCSC) - 9-7
2. Chen/McQuaid (SCU) def. Brian Casey/Parmelly (UCSC) - 8-3
3. Bedilion/Hidalgo (SCU) def. Seeberger/Templeman (UCSC) - 9-7

Dec 20, 2003
Slugs Represent - 5th in Nation on ITA DIII Rankings

MIAMI, FL -- The ITA Div. III National Rankings just came out and the Slugs are very well represented. UC Santa Cruz was ranked 5th in the team rankings. The Casey brothers must have set some kind of Div. III record as they were both ranked in the Top 11 in the country with Brian ranking 6th and Kevin ranking 11th! Shane Templeman is ranked 24th and Matt Brunner is ranked 31st, which ties UC Santa Cruz and top-ranked Emory University with the most players ranked in the Top 40! With freshman Matt Seeberger joining us in January, the Slugs will have a very formidable singles lineup.

UCSC also had two doubles teams ranked in the Top 20 in the country as Brian Casey and Bryce Parmelly were ranked 13th and Matt Brunner and Kellen Ali-Christie were ranked 20th.
    See ITA Rankings (12-3-2003)

Oct 5, 2003
Seeds of Success Fell To Slugs at West Region Championships

The UCSC Men's Tennis Team participated in the Omni West Region Championships over the weekend at Claremont College. Every one of the top eight seeds in the tournament fell to a Slug. In the second round, Jeff Olson defeated number five seed J.R. Hall of Pomona in straight sets. Also in the second round Andrew Cohen beat a very strong JC transfer to Cal Lutheran, JV Valejos, 6-4, 6-3. Henry Hasegawa beat two quality players in the opening rounds in Kyle Ellison of Claremont and Brett Baker of Occidental before falling to second seed David Frankel. Justin Coupe defeated the fourth seeded John Michael Cham-a-Koon of Claremont 2-6, 6-4, 6-1. Shane Templeman, coming off a great freshman season, played wonderfully in defeating a tremendous player seeded 3rd in Redland's Brian Murphy. Matt Brunner, who was red hot at the end of last year, picked up where he left off and showed the promise that many saw last year in defeating teammate and number one seeded Brian Casey in the quarter finals. Kevin Casey, who was unable to play most of the summer due to an injury, was in top form all tournament. In the quarter finals, Kevin bested number two seeded David Frankel of Pomona 6-4, 6-3 in a great match.

In doubles we also had some amazing efforts. Henry Hasegawa and Jeff Olson defeated the 5th seed in the first round and went on to reach the quarters before falling to the top seeds 8-5. Newcomer Brian Batsel teamed with Matt Brunner to reach the semi-finals defeating 3 seeds Brian Murphy and Travis Kula of Redlands 8-4 in the quarter finals. Our top team from last year, Brian Casey and Bryce Parmelly reached the final before falling in a great match to top seeds David Frankel and JR Hall of Pomona 8-6.
==> See related article in the Santa Cruz Sentinel.

Coach Bob Hansen inducted into Tennis Hall of Fame

July 25, 2003
Tennis Coach Bob Hansen:
A Hall of Fame Guy

UCSC Head Men's Tennis Coach Bob Hansen was inducted into the Northern California Tennis Hall of Fame at the 2003 Bank of the West Classic on July 24th.

Coach Hansen's career includes NCAA team titles in 1989-95-96-98 and reaching the final four in fourteen of the past fifteen years and the finals in ten of the past fifteen. Last year he was honored as the ITA coach of the Decade for the 90s.

==> See related article in the Santa Cruz Sentinel

UCSC Sophomore Matt Brunner was one of three Banana Slugs to win their singles' matches against Williams College in the quarterfinals.

May 18, 2003
Men's Tennis loses to Williams at NCAA Championships

For the third consecutive year, the UCSC Men's Tennis Team saw its season end at the hands of the Eephs of Williams College.

UC-Santa Cruz was the #4 seed in the eight-team tournament while Williams was unseeded. Williams jumped out to a 3-0 lead after winning the doubles point and the #2 (Andrew Murray over Kevin Casey 4-6, 6-1, 6-2) and #3 (Jeff Kivitz over Shane Templeman 5-7, 6-0, 6-4) singles matches. UC-Santa Cruz, however came storming back and tied the match at 3-3 with wins at #1 singles (Brian Casey over John Haywood, 6-2, 6-7 (3), 6-4), #4 singles (Andrew Cohen over Dan Murray 6-2, 6-4) and #5 singles (Brett Brunner over Tim White 6-4, 6-4). The match was decided at #6 singles where Lex Urban defeated Ben Bartels 7-6 (5), 4-6, 6-3.

UCSC lost to Williams in the Finals in 2001 and the Semifinals in 2002. Whereas in the past two seasons Williams would go on to win the National Championship, this year they would lose in the Finals to Emory University.

The Singles Championship proved somewhat dissapointing for the Banana Slugs. #6 seed UCSC Junior Brian Casey was upset in the first round by Nick Barnes of Coe College, 7-5, 7-6 (2). Brian's brother, Sophomore Kevin Casey, made it to the second round before bowing out against Eric Butorac from Gustavus Adophus, (6-0, 6-1)

In the Doubles championship, UCSC's top team of Matt Brunner and Ben Bartels lost to Nick Barnes and Nick Frank from Coe College 7-5, 6-0.

Portions of this article courtesy of Gustavus Adolphus Sports Information.

• Boxscore: Williams defeats UC Santa Cruz 4-3
• Tournament Homepage

May 7, 2003
Letter from Coach Hansen: Men's Tennis headed to NCAA Championships

Dear Slug Tennis fans,

We did it!! We are off to St Peter MN next Monday to play in the final 8 of the NCAA Team Championships. We defeated a very good U of Redlands team 5-2 in the round of 16. We kept our streak alive of never having lost a regional final at home. After losing the doubles point, we had a great effort at two doubles with Bryce and Brian up 6-2 when we stopped, we came out strong in singles winning 1-5 singles all in straight sets!

Matt Brunner started things off with a dominating performance at 4 singles. He was off the court with a 6-2,6-2 win when Brian Casey was at 4-3 in the first set! He has been playing incredible tennis lately and his effort set the tone. Next off was Andrew Cohen who played a super match at 5 singles in winning 6-3,6-4. He did a great job closing out the match after letting a 4-1 lead slip to be down 4-4 15-40 before breaking and holding with some great play. Freshman sensation Shane Templeman was next off with a 6-3,6-0 win at three singles. Shane started slowly but was dominant in closing out the match. Kevin Casey battled back from 0-3 in the first to win it in a breaker and then closed out the match 6-4. He played very well and really enjoyed putting the match on ice. Brian was next off and showed his mental strength in saving 7 set points in the first set before winning 7-6,6-2 against one of the regions strongest players, Brian Murphy.

I will send details of our draw as they become available but I really wanted to thank the great crowd that came to the match. Your support was key to us moving on and it is much appreciated. Many parents came from great distances and we all felt honored to have you here. We had several past National Champions in the crowd as well as our mental and spiritual coach Jerry Lynch. The combination of all that support and our mental strength and character carried the day. I am very proud of this group and look forward to continuing our drive for five!

We just found out that both Brian and Kevin Casey were selected to compete in the individual single championship and Matt Brunner and Ben Bartels will compete in the individual doubles championship. It is indeed and honor to be selected as one of the top 32 singles players in the country and top 16 doubles teams. With over 340 teams in the country these selections are tough to come by. Brian Casey was also honored at the "Player to Watch" from the west region. In competition for this award were many fine players and I am pleased to have Brian honored in this fashion.

In the team competition we face a stiff test as we drew defending NCAA team champions Williams College in the quarter final round. If we were to get by them we play the number one seed and host school, Gustavus Adlophus in the semifinal round. We are all very excited about the challenge and will be well prepared going in. The schedule of matches for the team are yet to be set but is our guess is that we will play our first round on Wed May 14th at 2:00.

If you would like to follow our progress of our team the web address for the championships is: http://www.gustavus.edu/oncampus/athletics/mt/mt.html.
Thanks again for your support and interest and go Slugs!!

Coach Hansen

Scores from the NCAA Western Regional
• Round 1 - Redlands vs. Cal Lutheran
• Round 2 - UCSC vs. Redlands

Junior Brian Casey made the finals at the 2003 Ojai Invitational.

April 29, 2003
Letter from Coach Hansen: Men's Tennis does well at Ojai; set to host NCAA Regionals

Dear Slug fans,

We just returned from Ojai where the Slugs played some inspired tennis. Brian Casey continues to amaze with his balanced attack as he rolled to his second straight Ojai singles final. He defeated the top ranked player in the region in Ivan Yea in the semi's in a titanic battle that lasted over three hours for two hotly contested sets. ivan served for the first set but Brian broke to force a tiebreaker where he elevated his game to dominate 7-3. In the second he served for the match at 5-4 but was broken. Ivan held off three match points before Brian secured the win 7-5 in the second. In the final, at a packed Libby Park, Brian lost to Cal Lutheran's Amir Marandy 6-3, 6-2.

Matt Brunner played amazing tennis in reaching the third round and was the only player to take a set off Marandy. Matt won the first and was up a break in the second before falling 4-6, 6-4,6-4. It was the best I had ever seen Matt play but I have said that a lot this year. Shane Templeman and Kevin Casey played some great doubles in reaching the quarter finals. They beat two quality teams and showed the skills to challenge anyone at their spot. Ben Bartels defeated a one player from Chapman and looked very good before losing to a top player from Redlands. Andrew Cohen played well in advancing to the second round where he had set points against the top player from the Pacific Northwest. Bryce Parmelly and Brain Casey also reached the quarter finals in doubles and continue to grow and improve.

We just received the news that we are the top ranked team in the tough West Region and will host the first rounds of the NCAA tournament this coming weekend. Cal Lutheran will play Redlands University on Sat May 3rd at 1:00 at the East Fieldhouse courts and the winner will play UC Santa Cruz at 1:00 on Sunday May 4th for the right to go the final site on May 14-17 at Gustavus Adolphus in St Peter MN. Redlands has beaten the defending NCAA Champions earlier this year as well as having beaten the Slugs. Cal Lutheran has beaten Redlands twice as well as two other top ten teams so the tennis both days should be amazing. We would love to have as many of you as possible join us as we could really use your support. Our team is growing daily but is still relatively young. We will be severely tested but the team that survives will be battle tested for the final site.

Thanks so much for the help and support from Duke and Janet Parmelly and Annie Cohen at Ojai. We were well fed because of their help and we really appreciate you being there for us. Thanks to all of you that follow the team and we hope to have a huge crowd for regionals. In case of rain we have indoor backup at Club Sport Pleasanton and I will post directions in the event we have to go indoors.

Best wishes,
Coaches Bob and Nick and all the Slugs

Coach Bob Hansen Photo courtesy of USTA NorCal

April 28, 2003
Coach Hansen to be inducted into the Northern California Tennis Hall of Fame

UCSC Head Men's Tennis Coach Bob Hansen will be inducted into the Northern California Tennis Hall of Fame at the 2003 Bank of the West Classic at Stanford's Forbes Plaza on Thursday, July 24th.

Hansen started the tennis teaching program at UC Santa Cruz in 1977 and got the campus to start a varsity squad three years later. In the process he had to convince the school to become a Division III NCAA school, which meant adding more sports. That done, Hansen won NCAA team titles in 1989-95-96-98. He was declared Coach of the Decade for the 1990s by the Intercollegiate Tennis Association.

"But it's all about the kids," says Hansen. "It's the relationships you form. I had just as much fun on the way up as I did being at the top. We had a 20-year reunion recently and it was wonderful. I am blessed to have this job."

Joining Hansen in the 2003 class are former US Open doubles winner Robin White, Inside Tennis Publisher William G. Simons and award-winning umpire Joan Vormbaum.

• The Norcal Call - Spring 2003
• The Norcal Call - Winter 2003

Portions of this article provided courtesy of the USTA NorCal Sectional Quarterly Newsletter.

April 24, 2003
Letter from Coach Hansen: Men's Tennis at the Ojai Invitational

Dear Slug Tennis fans,

So sorry that it has been so long since my last update. We are leaving shortly for Ojai and the wonderful Div lll Regional Singles and Doubles championships. This is an amazing tournament that is the envy of all other college tournaments. It's been going over 100 years and has a rich history of class and professionalism. The web site is www.ojaitennistourney.org and you can follow the progress of the over 1,500 total entrants on line. We begin play on Friday early am and hopefully will still be at it come Sunday.

We finished a successful dual match season in LA beating two of our top regional rivals, 5-2 against Trinity and 7-0 against Pomona. We did suffer a loss to Redlands, falling 3-4 in a well played match. Our region is very strong and evenly matched this year. The top five teams all have wins against each other and although it remains somewhat unclear I think UC Santa Cruz and Claremont are the top teams going into regionals. We have put in a bid to host and will get confirmation on Monday if this will happen. The regionals are May 3 & 4 and depending on whether they send two or three teams to our site we will either play on Sat May 3rd at 1:00 or Sunday May 4th at 1:00 vs the winner of a Sat match. We would love to have as much support as possible so we can keep our streak alive of having never lost a regional qualifying match at home. Mark your calenders and I will confirm on Monday as soon as we receive the final confirmation.

We seem to be peaking at the right time and are getting strong efforts from the entire lineup. It was nice to have the support of family and friends in LA during our recent trip and I want to extend our thanks to all who joined us. We have a wonderful group of young men on this years team and they do a great job representing themselves and this University. Your support and well wishes are greatly appreciated and we hope to see those of you that can make it at our last home stand of the season.

Best wishes,
Bob Hansen, Nick Cunningham and the Slug Tennis Team

UCSC Sophomore Matt Bruener won his match on Monday playing in the #3 singles spot.

April 8, 2003
Men's Tennis loses at USF

San Francisco, CA -- The Men's Tennis team lost to Divison I University of San Francisco on Monday by a score of 2-5.

Playing at the Olympic Club in San Francisco, UCSC collected wins at #3 and #4 singles, courtesy of Sophomores Matt Bruner and Ben Bartels. UCSC also won at #2 doubles, as Junior Brian Casey and Sophomore Bryce Parmelly won 8-6.

The event was a make-up of a match that had originally been scheduled for February 19th, but had been postponed due to rain.

With the loss, the teams record falls to 6-5 with a 3-1 record against Division III opponents.

The team plays its next match April 11 in Pomona against Trinity University.

Doubles
Lien/Fuller (USF) d. Bruner/Bartels (SC) 8-3
Casey/Parmelly (SC) d. Lippert/Elvik (USF) 8-6
Arneson/Pires De Almeida (USF) d. Templeton/Hasagawa (SC) 8-3

Singles
Pablo Pires De Almeida (USF) d. Brian Casey (SC) 7-5, 6-3
Axel Elvik (USF) d. Shane Templeton (SC) 6-4, 6-2
Matt Bruner (SC) d. Sean Dizon (USF) 6-3, 7-5
Ben Bartels (SC) d. Jon Lippert (USF) 6-4, 7-5
Ramoin Van Rillas (USF) Bryce Parmelly (SC) 6-4, 6-4
Christian Dyvik (USF) d. Justin Coupe (SC) 6-3, 6-1

UCSC Sophomore Andrew Cohen was one of two victorious UCSC players on Monday.

March 10, 2003

UCSC -- On Monday, the Men's Tennis team lost to visiting Emory University, 2-5 at the East Field Tennis Courts.

The match started poorly for UCSC, with the Banana Slugs being swept in doubles matches.

Single match play was extremely competitive, with all six matches going to three sets. At the #1 spot, Junior Brian Casey won his match, 6-4, 4-6, 6-4. At #2, Brian's brother, Sophomore Kevin Casey lost 4-6, 6-2, 2-6. At #3, Freshman Shane Templeman lost 1-6, 6-2, 2-6. At #4, Sophomore Andrew Cohen won 6-2, 0-6, 6-4. At #5, Sophomore Matt Bruehner lost 4-6, 7-5, 1-6. And at #6, Sophomore Ben Bartels lost 5-6, 6-4, 4-6.

Emory, ranked #2 in the nation, last season became the first visiting team to beat UCSC on its home courts since they were built in 1988.

With the loss, the teams record falls to 6-4 with a 3-1 record against Division III opponents.

The team plays its next match April 11 in Pomona against Trinity University.

Letters from Coach Hansen

March 11, 2003

Dear Slug Tennis fans,

Emory is the only Div lll team that has beaten us at home since our courts were built in 1988 and besides being a homecoming for former Slug and current Emory Coach John Browing, it is becoming a great rivalry. We won our third National Championship at Emory where we played them in the final in 1996. We had never lost to them until last year when they beat us at home. They have an incredible team! Every player in the top 13 played at the National Junior Championships at Kalamazoo and have wonderful junior backgrounds. We have only had one player in our 26 year history that played in this event and we knew we were in for a battle.

After losing the doubles point we locked into all the singles matches. We won the first set at one and four singles but dropped the first set in the remaining spots. By stepping up our offense we battled back in each of the matches where we lost the first but dropped both sets in the matches where we had won the first. All six singles went to three sets! I was very proud of our fight and felt we had a chance at every spot. Andrew Cohen leveled the match at one all with a victory at four singles. He had lost 9 straight games in going down 0-3 in the third before winning five straight games. He closed out the match 6-4 in the third. We lost the next two matches at two and three singles and I feel that we allowed our opponents too many chances to take charge. As both Kevin and Shane work on their attacking skills and control more of the match I know they will be able to compete against any opponent. At one singles Brian Casey beat one of the most offensive minded Div lll singles players ever as he beat Mark Odgers 6-4,4-6,6-4. It was a great win for Brian as this player has special talent! Matt Brunner was next off and lost his first Div lll match of the season to a very crafty and competitive player. It was a match I feel Matt could win with more work on his offensive skills. Ben Bartels was last off and had a great battle which he came up short in 6-4 in the third. In an interesting side note the winner of the first set won all six singles matches.

I am very proud of the team and feel good that we can be right in a match against a team of this caliber. I think they have the most talented team in the country and it will be a fun and challenging run at this years tournament. We have quite a long break before we are back at it as we have finals at the end of this week and them spring break.

Our next set of matches will be in LA against regional rivals Trinity, Redlands and Pomona the second weekend in April. Thanks to all those that came out to support us and best wishes to all,

Bob, Nick and the Slugs

March 9, 2003

Dear Slug tennis fans,
So far it has been a great weekend! On Saturday we beat regional Div lll rival Cal Lutheran 5-2 in a very well played match. It was nice to see the team respond from a rough outing at Indoors with a very well played match. We won at one and three doubles with solid play from Ben Bartels and Matt Brunner at one doubles and Kevin Casey and Bryce Parmelly at three doubles to secure the doubles point. In singles we got a great effort from Kevin Casey at two singles in winning 6-3,6-3 against a very strong opponent. Shane Templeman played very well at three singles defeating a strong junior college transfer 6-1,6-4 and showing more aggressive play inside the baseline. At five singles Matt Brunner continued his fine play with a dominating performance. The final singles point came from Ben Bartels who won 6-4,6-4 to close out the match. Brian Casey played very well at one singles before falling to one of the top players in the country in a closely contested match.

On Sunday we traveled to UC Davis to renew our UC rivalry. We played very well at two and three doubles to set up a great singles effort. Brian Casey and Shane Templeman won at two doubles 8-4 and Kevin Casey and Bryce Parmelly won at three doubles 9-7. In singles Shane Templeman and Matt Brunner won by identical scores of 6-0,6-0. Againt a quality team such as UC Davis who is top 20 in Div ll these are very impressive scores. At two singles Kevin Casey showed his increased offensive skills in defeating a fine player name Paul Dilloway 1-6,7-5,6-1. Kevin was overpowered in the first set and then controlled more and more of the points as the match progressed. Andrew Cohen played well with a 6-4,7-6 win at four singles and showed a great balance of passing shots and forcing ground strokes. I was happy with how hard he worked and how focused he was. Ben Bartels won a very solid match at six singles to complete the 7-2 team victory as he defeated Kikoli Novikov 6-3,4-6,6-0.

Tomorrow, Monday March 10th, we host the only Div lll team to have ever beaten us at home on our courts which were built in 1988. They were NCAA team finalists last year and are currently ranked two in the country. Anyone who can join us is in for a great match which will be at the East Fieldhouse at 2:00.

Best wishes and thanks for your support,
Bob Hansen, Nick Cunningham and the Slugs

January 21, 2003

Dear Slug Fans,

The 2003 season is officially underway. We just returned home from playing the Broncos of Santa Clara University, a match we lost 5-2. I was glad that we were able to play some extra players as at this time of the season our lineup is still taking shape. In the top three doubles matches we lost quite convincingly and spent most of the matches on our heels. At four doubles Bryce Parmelly and Justin Coupe won their match 8-6 behind aggressive net play and big serving. It was nice to finish the double with a win and Bryce and Justin showed the other teams what we want all of our doubles teams to do...close!!!

In singles Andrew Cohen was first off losing 6-2, 6-1 to a strong left hander, Taylor Bedilion. Andrew hit the ball well but was unable to finish enough at net nor could he penetrate effectively off the ground. Matt Brunner was next off with an impressive straight set win over Rick Ruso of the Broncos. Matt was very steady throughout and played with great poise and desire.

This match was followed by Kevin Casey dropping a 6-2,6-3 decision to Francisco Zepponi at two singles putting the match score at 1-3. Kevin needs to continue to take control of more points against players at this level and I know he will continue to develop this part of his game. In the remaining matches we were all in the third sets.

Brian Casey came back from down a break to win 6-3 in the third at one singles against the very talented Erich Chen. As always Brian was very resourceful in defeating Erich for the first time. His leadership and play at the top will be strong contributors to our success this season. Freshman Shane Templeman fought back from losing the 1st set to take a commanding 5-2 lead in the third against a fine player from Argentina. After having three match points he lost an 8-6 tiebreaker to decide the match. Shane needed to control more of the match in the end as he found himself consistently on the defensive in the deciding moments of the match.

Bryce Parmelly played a great first set and battled back in the second. His senior opponent lifted his level in the third to close out the match. With continued work on his serve and volley skills Bryce will be a tough out as the season progresses.

Justin Coupe won easily in his exibition singles match and is showing strong direction in his game.
Overall I felt like we showed real promise and played a much closer match than in recent years against the Broncos. This group is very focused and will grow from this match. Next up are two key Div lll rivals in Claremont College and Linfield College. Both teams made the NCAA team tournament last year and are two of the top teams in our region. We play a double header against them with the match against Claremont at 9:30 and the match against Linfield at 2:00 on Saturday February 8th at the East Fieldhouse at UC Santa Cruz. Please come join us if you can as these are key matches for out season.
Thanks so much to the Brunners, alumni and former NCAA national champion Chad Andrews, Doug Fitty, Kathy Casey, Kellen Ali-Christy and the rest of the Slug fans that made the trip. Your support is greatly appreciated.

I am attaching our schedule in hopes you will be able to make some matches. Thanks again for your support and Go Slugs!

November 21, 2002

Dear Slug Tennis Fans,

Hope you are all doing well and that your year is finishing on a high note. We have had a very productive fall program and are looking forward to an exciting season. I will send you our schedule as soon as it is finalized. As always we need to raise substantial funds to run our program. We spent the entire funding given to us from the school on our first trip to LA for the Omni tournament and so the rest of the season will depend on our fundraising efforts. As most of you know we run several tournaments, have an annual hit-a-thon, sell media guide adds and then get help from our many alumni and boosters. This year we found a wonderful new fund raiser through ESPN the magazine. If you send me a check for $40 made out to the UC Santa Cruz Foundation along with your address, phone number and email address you will receive a two year subscription (52 issues) to ESPN the magazine and Slug tennis will get $30 of your $40 payment. If you would also like a slug tennis T-shirt please make the check for $60 and you will get this as well. The subscription makes a great gift for any sport fan and if you send us someone else's name and address with a check to UC Regents we will send them a subscription with a gift card to announce your gift sent to you. I am amazed that they could do this for such a nominal fee and it will help us a great deal. Please help us take advantage of this great offer of support for Slug Tennis. We have a great young team and along with the old coach we would be most appreciative!! Thanks so much for all your care and support.

Send orders to:
Bob Hansen
OPERS East Fieldhouse UCSC
1156 High St
Santa Cruz, CA 95064

Any questions call me at 831 459-4694
Thanks again and best wishes,
Coach Hansen and the Slugs

10/11/02

Dear Slug fans,

The 2002/2003 Slug Tennis campaign in off and running. After a short preseason practice schedule we just returned from the Omni Hotels, formerly Rolex, West Regional Championships where the Slugs sputtered, recovered and roared to life. There are many impressions from our first competitive outing but the top couple are that are region is very strong this year and we are up to the challenge! This is a tournament that we have dominated for many years. We have had as many as five of the final eight in singles and three of the final four in doubles. This year after completing two rounds in the expanded 48 singles draw there were only three Slugs in the final 16, Brian and Kevin Casey and Matt Brunner. We dropped two singles matches that were well within our reach as last year's regulars Ben Bartels and Andrew Cohen lost to Freshmen from Redlands. At several other spots we faced tough opponents and failed to advance. After an intense team meeting we came to play on day two and three. All three of the remaining main draw players advanced to the quarters giving us the most of any team to reach that round. Matt Brunner soundly defeated Cal Lutheran senior and the 7th seed Arif Hasan 6-0,6-3 before falling to top seed All-American Slug superstar Brian Casey 6-3,6-3 in the quarters. Kevin reached the quarters with an easy 1 and 1 victory over Chris Kan of Claremont before falling to the three seed, a talented French player from Cal Lutheran. In am match closer than the 6-3,6-1 score indicated, it was obvious that Amir Marndy was a player of special talent. 

After beating a strong Claremont starter from last year in the opening round, Palmer Taylor was impressive in reaching the semi finals of the second round backdraw. His work this summer paid off with a much more consistent backcourt game that frustrated opponents. Freshman Evan Markowitz also reached the semis of the second round backdraw defeating a very solid freshman from Claremont that played the junior nationals as the second ranked player from Hawaii. After losing to the talented Marandy in the second round, Slug Freshman Shane Templeman swept the backdraw in impressive fashion. In the first round backdraw Ben Bartles won it all sweeping Slugs Josh Roach, Henry Hasegawa in three sets, and Brice Parmelly in the finals. After a rough first day the Slugs dominated both back draws.

In his semi final singles match Brain Casey played beautifully in defeating Williams transfer David Frankel of Pomona College 6-4,6-4. Down 2-3 and 0-40 Brian battled back to hold and turned the momentum of the match. Frankel looked stronger than last year when he played two for the NCAA team champion team from Williams and it took a great effort from Brian to beat him. In doubles the newly formed team of Brian and Kevin Casey played very well in advancing to the final with and impressive win over the two seeded team of Amir Marandy and Arif Hasan. 

In the finals of both the singles and doubles with a chance to advance to the Omni Small College National tournament the Slugs struggled. Amir Marandy was too much for Brian on this day but as usual Brain fought hard and raised the level of his game in the second set making a wonderful match in a 6-1,6-4 defeat. There were many lessons for Brian and the team and we have begun the work to close the gap already. Brian is a wonderful leader and example to our program and this setback will only serve to fuel his competitive fire. In the doubles final Kevin played very well in his first real doubles action as he was a singles specialist last season. His progress has been remarkable and I feel that we will again be very competitive in doubles as the season progresses. Although they lost to a talented Redlands team, both Brian and Kevin will be solid in this years doubles lineup.

Next up for the Slugs will be the UOP Tiger Invitational in a couple of weeks. Thanks to Annie Cohen and the Taylor's for her help and support and to Slug Alumni Thomas Oechel and Jake Stevens for coming out. Congratulations to the Slug women's team who not only had their first ever finalists in either singles or doubles but won both events! 

Coach Hansen

May 24, 2002
Letter from Coach Hansen

Dear Slug fans,

What a year! I just got the news that at the banquet we missed Nick Cunningham was honored as the West Region Senior of the Year. I couldn't agree more as he provided muscle and leadership to our young team and helped pave the way for a very bright future. We all hope he comes back to help coach the team next year.

Brian Casey reached the quarter finals of the NCAA tournament before losing to the top seed Josh Lefkowitz of Williams. It was a match he could have won but, partly due to his more than generous line calls, he lost in two closely contested sets. This was only his second loss of the season and he put together one of the greatest years in our illustrious history. He was honored as the Western Region Player to Watch and this year he was by far the most successful player in our region. If he continues to improve at this rate he will be a very rough out next season!

Kevin Casey was voted the Western Region Rookie of the Year over some very fine candidates. He also had an amazing year and will be a strong leader in years to come. He is developing a strong reputation within our region as the Casey legend expands.

The old man won the Wilson ITA National Coach of the Year which reflects the fine season produced by our amazing young team. I was deeply honored as I think this was a remarkable season. To have so many players recognized for their play and leadership says volumes about this team. What it doesn't say is the incredible love and respect they have for each other. I am equally as proud of them for this development as I am for the tremendous growth in their games.

Thanks so much to all the alumni that continue to support the growth of the program. Your leadership and support is so critical to our continued success. I hope you enjoy staying involved as much as I enjoy having you involved. Xerxes Whitney wants to coordinate an alumni event in the fall so stay tuned.

Thanks to all the parents for all your support. Not only did you provide wonderful raw material in your sons but your caring and support of the program allows us to create an environment where our players can grow and develop rapidly and with rich depth of character.

Thanks to all the wonderful folks at OPERS for all the work on hosting the NCAA tournament. It was so great to showcase our school, our program, and all the wonderful aspects of this wonderful place we call home. I was amazed at how we all came together to produce such a wonderful event. Special thanks to Laura, Steve, Diane, Greg, Dan, Karol, Denise, Cara, Alo, Dave Houston, and Darren Potkey. I hope we will have a chance to get everyone together to celebrate this event. Thanks also to the wonderful help of the women's basketball and soccer teams.

Thanks so much for the wonderful support of our sports psychologist Dr Jerry Lynch for your incredible guidance and support. Your wonderful spirit lives in this team.

Thanks to Warren Scott for your ongoing help with keeping our players healthy.

Assistant Coaches Gladkin and Stevens -what a team. Thanks from all of us for your totally unselfish gift to the team. I could not have done it without you and I value the development of our friendships through the work.

Finally thanks to the wonderful young men that made up this years team. You have been the best of what athletics is all about. You are a team in the finest sense of the word and I look forward to share many more great adventures with you. We will have a celebration when school permits but till then thanks for the great season.

Bye for now and best wishes,
Coach Hansen

5/22/02 Above: Josh Lefkowitz of Williams College competes in the Championship Final. Below: After the match, Lefkowitz celebrates his championship with Head Coach Dave Johnson.

May 22, 2002
NCAA Championships: Lefkowitz takes singles title

SANTA CRUZ -- Josh Lefkowitz of Williams College came into the 2002 NCAA Championships the #1 ranked player in the nation - and throughout the championships, he rarely gave anyone reason to think he should be otherwise.

Lefkowitz won the Singles National Championship, defeating Kevin Whipple of Gustavus Adolphus, 6-3, 2-6, 6-1, in the final on Wednesday. Lefkowitz, a senior, ends his collegiate career having led his team to three team National Championships and now winning a singles championship.

Lefkowitz faced tough competition throughout the gruelling three-day five-round competition that at one point had to be postponed and moved because of rain.

On Tuesday, Lefkowitz had defeated UCSC Sophomore Brian Casey, the last Banana Slug in the championships, 6-4, 6-2 in the quarterfinals.

In the semifinals Wednesday morning, Lefkowitz defeated Kayvon Fatahalian of Carnegie Mellon, 6-3, 6-3. Fatahalian had won the Singles Championship as a Sophomore in 2000.

It is the first Men's Singles title ever won by Williams College.

Earlier today, John Cham-A-Koon and Ivan Yeh of Claremont Mudd-Scripps won the NCAA DIII Doubles National Championship on Wednesday, defeating Kyle Harding and Jeff Keen of Kalamazoo, 6-4, 6-2 in the Final.

Cham-A-Koon and Yeh endured a grueling four round doubles tournament over the past three days which saw them play many of the top doubles pairs in the nation. In the Semifinals, they defeated the team of Rob Condiotty and Brian Murphy from Redlands, avenging an earlier defeat to that team in this year's regional championships.

This year saw UCSC's string of four straight doubles national championships snapped. UCSC's top doubles pair of Nick Cunningham and Brian Casey was defeated in the first round by Harding and Keen of Kalamazoo.

Williams College, led by Lefkowitz, won their second consecutive team National Championship on Saturday, defeating Emory University in a 4-3 thriller. Williams, who bested UCSC in last year's final, again defeated the Banana Slugs in the semifinals by a score of 4-3.

Congratulations to all the participants of the 2002 NCAA Division III Men's Tennis Championships!

The team draws, times and scores for the singles, doubles and team championships are available here:

• Singles / Doubles Results
• Championship Match - Williams College vs. Emory - 6:00 PM - Los Gatos
• Third-place match - UC Santa Cruz vs. Gustavus-Adolphus - 6:00 PM - Plasanton
• Semifinals 1 - Gustavas-Adolphus vs. Emory - 10:00 AM - East Field Courts
• Semifinals 2 - UC Santa Cruz vs. Williams - 2:00 PM - East Field Courts
• Quarterfinals 1 - Williams vs. Kalamazoo - 10:00 AM - East Field Courts
• Quarterfinals 2 - Bowdoin vs. Emory - 10:00 AM - West Field Courts
• Quarterfinals 3 - UC Santa Cruz vs. Washington - 2:00 PM - East Field Courts
• Quarterfinals 4 - Trinity vs. Gustavus Adolphus - 2:00 PM - West Field Courts

UCSC Senior Nick Cunningham is the #1 ranked player in the Western Region.

5/9/02
NCAA Men's Tennis Regionals

UC Santa Cruz plays host to the NCAA Men's Tennis Western Regionals this weekend.

The Banana Slugs will be hosting teams from the University of Redlands and Claremont Mudd-Scripps in a matchup of the top three teams in the western region.Claremont and Redlands will play on Friday, with the winner playing UCSC on Saturday. The winner will move on to play in the 2002 NCAA Division III Men's Tennis Championships hosted by UCSC from May 17-22. It will be the first time UCSC has hosted the NCAA Championship Final.

Match start time for the Redlands-Claremont match is at 2:00 PM Friday at the East Field Tennis Courts. UCSC will play the winner Saturday at 12:00 PM.

The Men's Tennis Team's record currently stands at 10-8, with all but one of those losses coming against top Division I and II opposition. They are currently ranked the #1 seed in the Western Region, and the #4 team in the country.

UCSC will also be hosting the 2002 NCAA National Championships for Division III Men's Tennis from May 17-22.

GoSlugs.com will have constant updates throughout both matches. Check back with us regularly for results:

• Regionals #1 - Redlands vs. Claremont M-S
• Regionals #2 - UC Santa Cruz vs. winner of Regionals #1
• NCAA Championships.com - Men's Tennis
• GoSlugs.com - 2002 Men's Tennis National Championships

UCSC Senior Nick Cunningham is the #1 ranked player in the Western Region.

5/7/02
Men's and Women's Tennis prepare for NCAA Regionals

Both the Men's and Women's Tennis teams will be competing in the NCAA Regional Championships this weekend.

The Men will be hosting teams from the University of Redlands and Claremont Mudd-Scripps in a matchup of the top three teams in the western region.Claremont and Redlands will play on Friday, with the winner playing UCSC on Saturday. The winner will move on to play in the 2002 NCAA Division III Men's Tennis Championships hosted by UCSC from May 17-22. It will be the first time UCSC has hosted the NCAA Championship Final.

The Men's record currently stands at 10-8, with most of those losses coming against top Division I and II opposition. They are currently ranked the #1 seed in the Western Region, and the #4 team in the country.

The Women's Tennis team will travel to Trinity College in San Antonio, Texas on Friday. Trinity is currently the #4 team in the country and the #1 seed in the Western region, compared to UCSC's #4 spot. A victory for the Banana Slugs will give UCSC its first appearance in the NCAA Championships in Head Coach Dave Muldawer's tenure. Strong performances by top UCSC players Freshman Katie Frick and Sophomore Sara Moglen will earn the players strong consideration for the the Singles National Championships.

The Women's record currently stands at 11-7 with a 7-3 record in Division III play.

UCSC Sophomore Brian Casey was the big winner in Men's Singles at Ojai

4/29/02
Men's Tennis: Brian Casey wins Ojai Championship

OJAI, CA -- UCSC Sophomore Brian Casey won the Ojai Tournament Division III Men's Singles Championship this past weekend, in the team's final warmup before the NCAA Regionals.

Casey, UCSC's #2 singles player, defeated five top Division III west opponents to take the title, defeating John M. Cham-a-koon from Claremont Mudd-Scripps in the Championship match, 7-6(3), 6-4.

In the semifinals, Casey defeated Brian Murphy of Redlands University, who a round earlier had defeated Casey's younger brother, UCSC Freshman Kevin Casey.

Casey was one of six players from UCSC in the 32-man draw, with Senior Nick Cunningham and Freshmen Kevin Casey, Matt Brunner, Andrew Cohen and Ben Bartels also participating. Cunningham, UCSC's #1 singles player, was upset in the second round by Darren Haworth from Linfield. Bartels also made the second round, only to lose to Rob Condiotty of Redlands.

UCSC's two representing doubles teams of Brian Casey with Nick Cunningham and Matt Brunner with Freshman Jeff Olsen both lost in the first round, but will look to bounce back strong May 11 at the NCAA Regionals, hosted by UCSC. UCSC has won the last four NCAA Doubles Championships, and five of the last six.

The NCAA Division III National Championships will be hosted by UCSC May 17-22.

• Ojai Tournament - DIII Men's Singles Brackets
• Ojai Tournament - DIII Men's Doubles Brackets

4/12/02 Senior Nick Cunningham, seen here against UC San Diego, should be more than ready to go at the NCAA Regionals

4/15/02
Men's Tennis cruises against Chapman; looks toward NCAA Regionals

SANTA CRUZ -- The Men's Tennis team cruised to an easy victory against Chapman University on Saturday at the East Field Tennis courts, winning 6-1 despite the late scratch of top singles player Senior Nick Cunningham at the start of singles play.

Cunningham and Sophomore Brian Casey won their #1 doubles match 8-4. UCSC won all three of its doubles matches. Cunningham sat out of singles play to rest his shoulder, prompting Coach Bob Hansen to promote Freshman Bryce Parmelly to the #6 singles spot.

The move did little to affect the outcome, as the Slugs went 5-1 in Singles play. Brian Casey, playing at #1, won his match 6-1, 6-1. His brother, Freshman Kevin Casey, was one of four Freshmen to take their singles matches in straight sets. He was joined by Andrew Cohen, Matt Brunner and Bryce Parmelly.

UCSC's only loss of the day came on Freshman Ben Bartels hard-fought 6-4, 4-6, 1-0 loss at #3 singles.

The day before, Bartels had been one of three Slugs to win singles matches in UCSC's narrow 3-4 loss to the the UCSD Tritons. The Tritons are nationally ranked at #8 for Division II in the latest ITA rankings.

With the weekend split, UCSC's record now stands at 10-8, with many of those matches coming against Division I and II opponents.

The teams' next action will be seen at the Ojai Invitational Tournament April 26-29.

UCSC will be hosting the NCAA Western Regional Championships on May 11-12. This will be a precursor, of course, to the NCAA Championships on May 17-22, which UCSC will hosting for the first time.

1/9/02 - ITA Division III National Team Indoor Championships field announced

Courtesy of ITA Media Relations

WALLA WALLA, WA -- Five of the top six NCAA Division III men's programs in the country will head to Whitman College for the Feb. 16-17 Intercollegiate Tennis Association (ITA) Division III National Team Indoor Championships.

Host Whitman will be joined by No. 2 Gustavus Adolphus (Minn.), No. 3 UC-Santa Cruz, No. 4 Redlands (Calif.), No. 5 Emory (Ga.) and No. 6 Trinity (Texas). Last February UC-Santa Cruz captured the inaugural title in Walla Walla, beating Emory in the final.

Emory will face Trinity in first round play on Feb. 16, with the winner facing Gustavus Adolphus in the semifinals that evening. The other side of the draw has Redlands facing Whitman in the first round, with the winner taking on UC-Santa Cruz in the semifinals.

All of the participating programs bring great histories to the event. Defending ITA Team Indoor champion UC-Santa Cruz leads the way with four NCAA team titles, including three since 1995. All told, the participants have combined to win 10 of the 26 NCAA Division III team titles.

Whitman coach Jeff Northam is the tournament chairman for this year's event, which is played at the Bratton Tennis Center on the Whitman campus.

2001 NCAA champ Williams, the top-ranked team in the country, is unable to participate next month due to scheduling conflicts.

Letter from Coach Hansen

5/7/02 - NCAA Regionals

Dear Slug Fans,

UC Santa Cruz was awarded the host site for the 2002 NCAA Tennis Regional Championships on Friday and Saturday May 10th and 11th. The winner of this tournament will advance to the NCAA final site also hosted by UC Santa Cruz on May 17-19 for the team championship and May 20-22 for the individual championships. The top seed in our regional is UC Santa Cruz who will play the winner of the Claremont McKenna and Redlands University match. The Friday match between Claremont and Redlands will be at the East Fieldhouse at 2:00 with the winner playing UC Santa Cruz on Saturday at 12:30 at the East Fieldhouse. We hope many of you will be able to come watch some great tennis at both regionals and nationals. The regional will be very competitive as Redlands was preseason ranked four in the country and UC Santa was three. Claremont has shown its strength is pushing the top two teams in the country, Williams College and Gustaphus Adolphus College, losing to both teams in closely contested 4-3 matches. When Redlands and Claremont recently faced each other all six singles matches were three sets with Redlands prevailing 4-3 in the match. This will be the strongest regional field in the country and should produce some fine tennis.

Sincerely,
Coach Bob Hansen

4/1/02 - Looking towards Regionals

Dear Slug fans,

We just returned from another wonderful trip to Ojai. This will be brief but I wanted to publicly congratulate Brian Casey as the 2002 Ojai singles champion. He won the title against a very strong field playing through the toughest part of the draw. He won in two breakers in the first round and had back to back three setters in the quarters and semi. In a great final match he won 7-6, 6-4 against John Cham-a-koon who played last year at Peperdine and was ranked in the top 150 in the US in junior tennis. It was an extremely well played match with both players at the top of their games. Brian showed the mental toughness combined with impeccable sportsmanship that makes him a favorite with players and coaches. He game was severely tested and he answered the bell time and time again throughout the tournament. Other great matches were turned in by Kevin Casey who reached the quarter finals with a stunning 6-1,6-0 win over the top player in the Pacific Northwest, Tim Mullen of Whitman, in the round of 16 before losing a great three setter to Brian Murphy of Redlands. I have never seen Kevin play so well and he seems to be getting better and better heading into the stretch run. Ben Bartels won a good first round match against the two player from Cal Lutheran before falling to Relands's top player. Andrew Cohen lost a tough first round match against finalist J Cham-a-koon. We have much work to do but this tournament will be another positive step towards preparing for the NCAA tournament. Rooms are going fast at the host hotel so if you are interested please call the West Coast Santa Cruz hotel at 831 426-4330. Again the dates of the team tournament are May 17-19. Talk to you all soon.

Best wishes, Coach Hansen and the Slugs

3/12/02 - Loss at home against Emory

In today's match against fourth ranked Emory University coached by another former Slug John Browning the Slugs got out quickly at one doubles with Nick Cunningham and Carlos Gonzalez winning in a very well played match 8-1. After losing at two doubles 8-2 the doubles point hinged on three doubles. Freshmen Ben Bartels and Andrew Cohen played very well in winning 8-6 to seal the doubles point. In singles the pattern of the day before prevailed as Nick, Carlos and Ben lost in straight sets which put the pressure of the match on the Casey brothers and Andrew Cohen. Brian defeated a very talented and agressive freshman Tyson Ramsay 6-4,6-2 and both Kevin and Andrew went to the third set. Kevin played some of his best tennis to date as he was more aggressive than ever in winning 6-3 in the third. Andrew Cohen was dictating play against his senior opponent but ran out of gas losing 6-3 in the third.

It was a great match and clearly sets the standard for the work ahead. Emory is certainly one of the top teams in the country and we played them very closely. I know with some work we will be able to compete at all spots and I am proud of our effort. This match marked our first ever Div lll loss on our courts that were build in 1988. It was an incredible run but I hope this will be the motivation we need to do the work to be a strong factor at this year NCAA tournament. We are hosting the final site for the first time ever and it would be sweet to win one for the thumb at home. Thanks to all that made it to the match. We will need your support as we face several more hurdles at home on this years schedule. I will keep you posted. Enjoy March Madness and then prepare for May Madness as the Slugs continue on the drive for five!

Bob Hansen, Assistant coach Peter Gladkin and the Slugs

1/19/02 - 2nd at ITA National Team Indoor Championships

Dear Slug Fans,

We just returned from the ITA National Team Indoor Championships in Walla Walla Washington. We entered the tournament as the defending champs and number two seeds. After receiving a first round bye we played number three seed Redlands University in a key West Region semi final show down. In doubles play the Slugs captured the point with wins by the number two doubles team of Brain Casey and newcomer David Johnson 8-6 and at three doubles with freshmen Andrew Cohen and Bryce Parmelly winning 8-3. Our upper classmen set the stage in singles with wins at the top three spots. Nick Cunningham won at one singles 6-4, 7-6; Brian Casey won at two singles 7-6,6-2 and Carlos Gonzalez won at three singles 7-6,7-5. All three matches we hard fought victories against quality opponents. I was impressed with our competitiveness and focus in each of these matches. Freshmen Kevin Casey rounded out the victory at number five singles giving the Slugs a 5-2 victory and moving us into the finals.

In the other semi final match top seeded Gustaphus Adlophus played Emory University coached by former Slug John Browning. In an epic battle remarkable similar to our semi final win last year Gustaphus Adlophus pulled out a thrilling 4-3 win over the very talented and young Emory team. This set up a battle of the top seeded Gustaphus Adolphus team against the two seeded UC Santa Cruz squad.

The Gusties have the most balanced doubles talent in the country and it was evident as they won all three doubles matches in the finals. At number two doubles the team of Brian Casey and Dave Johnson had two match points before going down 9-7 in a solid and well played match. This team has proved to be one of most consistent teams to date. We were not very competitive at one and three doubles and need these teams to continue to work on consistency and aggression. Carlos and Nick have shown great potential but haven't played enough together to consistently play at a high level. We are green but growing at three doubles and are still testing teams at this spot. Last year we lost the doubles point each time we played Gustaphus and still pulled out the matches so we hoped for the same this year. At one singles Nick Cunningham played last year NCAA singles finalist and one of the top players in the country Eric Butorac. Nick served hugh and competed extremely well in winning 6-4,7-5. I was very pleased to see Nick defeat such a fine player knowing he is still getting his singles game back after a long layoff with injuries that has kept him from playing many competitive singles matches. Brian Casey continues to shine at two singles and defeated a great player in Nick Crossley 7-6,6-3. Brian was down 3-5 in the first set breaker before winning the final 4 points to seize control of the match. At three singles Carlos Gonzalez played one of the toughest Gusties in singles, Div l transfer Kevin Whipple. He and Eric Butorac who also transferred from a Div l program, were the two singles players that won against UCSC in both matches last year. Carlos played well but lost a well contested match 7-6,7-5 showing stretches where he was able to control large parts of the match with aggressive groundies and strong play from the net. As Carlos continues to get stronger and make better shot selections he will be a force against any of the top teams. At four singles freshman Ben Bartels, who is coming of a wrist injury that kept him from practicing for several weeks prior to this event, struggled against veteran senior Michael Hom. I was pleased with how Ben handled himself and I know he is looking forward to getting back in form before our next contest. At six singles Freshman Andrew Cohen showed some brilliant shot making in rout to an 11-9 third set tiebreaker victory. Facing match point Andrew drilled a forehand winner and then played two more solid points to decide the match. This is his second victory when facing a match point and showed his composure under fire. With added strength and more consistency he will be a force in the singles lineup. Kevin Casey found himself in a similar situation that his brother faced last year against a very aggressive and experienced Gustie, Josh Heiden. Kevin played very well in losing a tough 7-6,6-3 battle. With a few more weapons Kevin will be able to compete with the very best at his position. I was pleased at how well we competed, especially in singles, and how the team in growing and learning from each competitive adventure. To have been given the opportunity to compete for a National Team Title this early in the season and come as close as we did gives up hope and determination to do the work that will hopefully lead to a similar opportunity as we host the NCAA tournament in May.

Thanks so much for the support of Rafael Gonzalez who made the trip to Walla Walla and provides help in so many ways! I would also like to thank all of the parents, alumni, and supporters of the program. Special thanks to Bobby Detrick for his help and to the ongoing work of Jerry Lynch as our team psychologist and Warren Scott for helping keep our players on court with his help as our team physician. Our next home match will be against Hardin Simmons University from Texas on March 8 followed by matches with Pomona Pitzer and UC Davis on March 9 and Emory on Monday March 11th.

Take care and thanks again for your interest and support.

Bob Hansen, Assistant coach Peter Glakin and the Slugs

1/28/02 - Season Begins

Dear Slug Tennis Fans,

We are off and rolling, (or limping!) We opened our season against a very strong Division l program, Santa Clara University, and although the outcome was stacked against us there were many positives to take from the match. At number one doubles Nick Cunningham and Carlos Gonzalez played a wonderful match in winning 8-6. They had several opportunities to break before capitalizing at 6 all. They played very well in stretches and served well enough to keep their opponents off balance throughout. At this point in the season they look like they will continue to be one of the top teams in the country in our Division and will compete successfully against anyone on our schedule. It was a great way to conclude the doubles as we had lost at two and three doubles. Brian Casey and Ben Bartels got off to a great start before a lapse where they were broken twice in the middle of the match. They have come a long way since the start of the year and look to be solid with more work at the net for both. At three doubles we are still looking for a solid combination. Transfer David Johnson and freshman Andrew Cohen played three doubles against Santa Clara and had some strong moments but also showed a lack of competitive experience at times. In singles we got great efforts from Nick Cunningham and Carlos Ganzalez who extended their opponents to three sets. Both Nick and Carlos are coming off injuries and it was great to see them play at a high level. With continued work and conditioning they will be very solid single spots and provide great leadership. Carlos lost a close tiebreaker in the third and was two points from a victory at 5-4 and 6-5 in the third. He played some spectacular points and competed very well. Ben Bartels played very well at four singles losing a hard fought match to one of the top junior players from Northern California, Franciso Zepponi 6-4,6-4. Ben is making many positive steps in his game and with improved volleys will be a force. Kevin Casey made some great adjustments in his match against Taylor Bedilion, another top Nor Cal junior player, and served for the second set before losing in a tiebreaker. Kevin's improved attacking game helped lift him in the second set. In our other two singles spots sophomore Brian Casey and freshman Andrew Cohen had rough matchups but fought hard. We all learned lessons that will help focus our training and pave the way for future success. It was great to take nine players on the trip with Bryce Parmelly playing seven singles and Matt Brunner playing fourth doubles with Kevin Casey. Our young guns are getting better all the time and I look forward to our next set of matches on Feb 8,9,10 where our first team will play three more Div l teams before heading off the the National Team Indoor Championships and the second team will get in a couple of matches as well. Thanks to all the parents and fans that made the trip and I hope to see you again at future matches.

Best wishes, Coach Hansen and the Slugs

12/13/01 - Happy Holidays from Slug Tennis

Dear Slug Tennis fans,

Happy Holiday!! Hope the season finds you counting your blessings and enjoying the holiday cheer. The ITA National Fall ranking just came out and 3 seems to be our number. We are ranked three as a team behind defending national champions Williams College and Gustavus Adolphus who returns all of their team from last season. After a wonderful fall season Soph Brian Casey is ranked three in the country in singles and Senior Nick Cunningham and Junior Carlos Gonzalez are ranked three in the country in doubles. We have a wonderful new group of players to compliment the leadership and fine play of our returning players. I felt like we had a very productive fall and I am very excited to see the work our players will do in preparation for the season. I will be sending more details as the season progresses but I wanted to thank all of you for your support of our program and wish you all a wonderful holiday. I have attached a copy of our schedule and I hope to see you all soon. Best wishes from all of us in Slugville.

Sincerely,
Coach Bob Hansen

10/18/01 - Fall Tennis

Dear Slug Superstars and Slug Superstar fans,

We are off and rolling again. My apologies for not writing sooner but it seems we have been in high gear since the season started. We began the year with our first ever before school training camp and it was a wonderful way to start the year. We had a full week to lay the foundation for the season and I feel that we have a clear track to run on and a clear direction from which to approach the season. Due to the graduation of four of our top seven from the team that won four of the six available National Championships from a year ago, we have some big shoes to fill. I have been extremely impressed with the quality of our new players and the quality of character they have shown so far. At the fall Western Regional Championships we played without our top returning singles player, Nick Cunningham, who chose not to play singles because of an injury to his elbow. Our other two returning singles players, Brian Casey and Carlos Gonzalez, had strong showings. Carlos advanced in convincing fashion to the quarter finals before losing in three sets to a great young player from Hong Kong who is now playing for Claremont. In this match Carlos dominated play for the first set and a half before tiring late in the second and third sets. Brian dominated the field in rout to the singles championship losing a total of 11 games in five matches! He was at his tenacious best showing vastly improved offensive skills as well as his trademark consistency. We won both the first round and second round backdraw flights with first year player Justin Coup winning the first round backdraw and freshman Andrew Cohen defeating team mate Jeff Olson in the second round backdraw final. All three of these new players showed great promise with these victories. Freshman Matt Brunner and Noah Farb advanced to the third round with impressive victories. In the doubles, last years NCAA doubles champion Nick Cunningham paired up with Carlos Gonzales to win the doubles title. It was great to see the potential this team has as they defeated several very strong teams including a come from behind victory in the finals against a very strong Redlands team. Carlos played both consistently and explosively throughout and combined with Nick's experience they played well at key times. Freshmen Matt Brunner and Jeff Olson won the backdraw in doubles. All in all it was a dominating performance as the Slugs won all the titles at the Regional Championships. UCSC's three newest All-Americans, Brian in singles and Carlos and Nick in doubles, will play in the Small College National Championships later this week in Playno Texas. Two other highly ranked freshmen that have shown great promise and have fine work ethics are Ben Bartels and Kevin Casey. In other Slug news Alumni Derek Fitzpatrick and Thomas Oechel just reached the semi finals of the masters event of the Southern California Professional Satelite Curcuit and were awarded 13 ATP points. With four NCAA double titles between them, they are great representative of Div lll strength as they defeated the current number one ranked Div l team in the country as well as many strong foreign professional teams. Special thanks for all those who supported the Golf Marathon, Bryan Shapiro, Morgan Magid, Morgan Shepherd, Scott Buss, Robin and Gordon Ulrey, Matt Houseman, Jeff Morse, Kevin and Kathy Casey, Justin Balas, Thor Evenhouse, Jesse Sira, Gordy Stroud, Bob and Suzanne Hansen and Pat Henson. Thanks also to Rafael Gonzales for his help with the training camp and his ongoing support of the team. It was great to see Slug Alums Derek Fitzpatrick, Thomas Oechel, Johathon Harper, PP coach Ryan Witt and Bryan Shapiro at the Regional Championships. And finally extra Special thanks to Slug parents Doug and Nina Fitzpatrick for coming to watch us play, taking the team to dinner and continuing their generous support of the program. Thanks also for the great dinner provided by the Brunner family on our LA trip. We are off and running in this new season and we have much to be excited about. Thanks you all for your great support of this fine program and I will keep you posted as the season progresses. If you would like to be taken off this list please reply. Best wishes to all.

Sincerely, Coach Bob Hansen and the Slugs

5/25/01 - End of Season

Dear Slug fans,

What a season! We finished with a bang reaching the finals of the NCAA national team championship and winning both the NCAA singles and doubles titles. Of the six National Championships up for grabs this year the Slugs won four, had one second and one third. Being the team we are I am certain that we would gladly give up the individual titles for the NCAA team championship but it was great to play for the team gold for the first time in three years.

Facing a tough draw as the fifth seed the Slugs battled to a 4-0 victory over Emory University in the quarter finals. Emory was the fourth seed and a very strong team coached by former Slug John Browing. After winning the doubles point with wins at one and two doubles Freshman Brian Casey started the singles with a 6-0,6-1 at five singles. He was followed by Nick Cunningham who won in straight sets at two singles to set up veteran Danny Kim for the clinching win at three singles. Down 2-5 in the set and then 2-5 in the tiebreaker Danny fought off a set point with a clutch winner off a backhand return before sealing the deal. The win put the Slugs in the final four for the 14th time in the last fifteen years!

In the semi final match UCSC faced top seed Gustavus Adolphus who entered the match with a 35-1 record. We had beaten them in the National Indoor tournament for their only previous loss coming back from a 1-3 deficit in a thrilling match. The NCAA semi final was no less spectacular as we again faced an uphill fight down 1-3 with three singles matches remaining. Nick Cunningham even the match at 1-1 before Derek Fitzpatrick lost at one singles and Danny Kim lost at three singles. With our backs to the wall Carlos Gonzalez started the comeback with a 7-6, 6-0 win at six singles. Down set point Carlos crushed two consecutive aces leading to a dominating second set. Brian Casey leveled the match with a 7-6,7-6 win at five singles setting the stage for senior Peter Gladkin at four singles. With the team score tied at 3 all Peter was down 2-3 in the third set. From here Peter hit the gas! Playing brilliant and inspired tennis Peter won the final four games to put the Slugs in the finals! His composure and ability to step up in the clutch were a joy to behold and I could not have been prouder of Peter and his teammates!

In the finals we faced Williams College in a rematch of the 1998 NCAA team championship match. We came out very focused in dominating the doubles. We clinched with wins from Derek and Nick at one doubles and Peter and Danny at two with Brian and Carlos leading and playing their best doubles of the tournament at three doubles. In singles Nick won the first set at two singles and Brian won the first set at five singles. Derek dropped a close set at one after reaching set point. Their singles strength began to take it's toll as Williams won first sets at four spots. All our players battled hard and I felt if we could have gotten any of the matches into a third set we would have had a great opportunity to win the three singles required for the championship. Of their top six players five of them had played at the National Junior Championships at Kalamazoo. In the twenty two year history of Slug Tennis we have had only one player ever that played at Kalamazoo so they definitely had the advantage in experience and background. Because of our courage to set such lofty goals and the depth of our competitive fire our guys were deeply hurt by finishing second in the team tournament. I applaud this courage and share their pain but have no regrets for the quality of their effort.

In the singles and doubles competition I was very pleased to see Derek and Nick play so well. After facing a set and 0-3 deficit in his first round singles match Derek did not drop another set in winning the NCAA singles title. He and Nick were equally devastating in winning the NCAA doubles title without the loss of a single set and having only one extended set. Their combination of quality ball striking, superior tactics, athleticism, and competitive maturity was very gratifying to watch and was a great way to end a wonderful season. (The Slug web site at goslugs.com has some great pictures and detailed articles from the tournament links) By winning the first National Team Indoor Championship, the National Rolex Small College Doubles championship, and the singles and doubles NCAA National Championships the Slug netters put their stamp on the 2001 season. I will really miss our three great seniors and their families as we face a new era of Slug Tennis. There are so many people I want to thank starting with our great players on this team. Their passion, competitiveness, compassion and love for eachother and this program were a marvel to be associated with. As usual many fans and parents from the other teams expressed their appreciation of the quality of our play and our attitude. Jerry Lynch did an outstanding job creating a link between out hearts, minds and bodies that allowed us to play all out in a bold and courageous manner. Dr Warren Scott did great work in helping us deal with the demands on our bodies with his excellent care and advice. All our tennis parents provided love and support without which we could not have been able to perform at such a high level or had the opportunities to train and compete. Thanks to all at OPERS who lend support and help. It was great to have Peter and Vicki Gladkin, Rapheal Gonzalez and his girls, and Jeff Stevens join us in Indiana. Special thanks to Doug and Nina Fitzpatrick for all their kindness and generosity and congratulations to Derek for being named the "Senior of the Year". It was a wonderful year and I am grateful to all of our fans and supporters for all your help in creating a program we can all be proud of. Please stay in touch and let me know if any of you are interested in playing in the Golf Marathon fund raiser on Wed June 13th.

Sincerely,
Coach Bob Hansen and the Slugs

5/14/01 - Seedings for NCAA Finals

Dear Slug Fans,
A couple of trying days! We got our bid to the NCAA tournament and I was sorely disappointed with the results. I have gone to great length with all them members of the selection committee and yet have not been able to convince them that they made a big mistake leaving Danny Kim and Peter Gladkin out of the individual doubles. We will be represented by Derek Fitzpatrick and Nick Cunningham in doubles and Derek, Nick and Danny in singles. This is still and enviable position for any team but I feel very strongly that Peter and Danny deserve to be in the tournament. In the team event we were put as the two team from the west even though we have beaten the top teams from the Midwest, East, and South this year. Redlands win over us seems to take priority over the rest of the year we have had and our only choice is to show what we are capable of at the tournament. We are to play Emory in the first round coached by former Slug John Browning. They have a great team and it should be a wonderful match. We beat them earlier in the year in the finals of the National Team Indoors. That match is to be played on Friday at 11:00. The winner of our first round is scheduled to play the winner of the Gustavus Adolphus MIT match Saturday at 10:30. You can follow the results over the web by linking to athletics at the Depauw web site at www.depauw.edu. We could use all you care and support so think good thoughts!!!!

On another plane we are having our semi annual golf marathon on Wednesday June 13th at Rancho Canada Golf Club in Carmel Valley. We are looking for adventurous folks who would like to play 100 holes of golf and raise pledges per hole for their efforts. Please send me a note if you are interested or if you know a golf fanatic that would! I will be hitting up the non players for a donation so join in on the fun!

Best wishes and I will next send you an update on our return. We will be at the Super 8 hotel in Plainfield for the first couple of days at 317/837-8888 and then move closer to the Hoiday Inn Express in Cloverdale at 765/795-5050 starting on Sunday. Thanks again for all your support.

Sincerely, Bob and the Slugs

5/14/01 - Slugs Advance To NCAA Finals

Dear Slug Fans,

Thanks so much to all of you that made the match. It was so nice to see all of you and we sincerely appreciate your support. Special thanks to Sean Sullivan and his great crew of student helpers as well as all the help provided by the service center, athletic training and maintenance crew. It was a very well run event that we can all be proud of. On to the match..... We played Pacific Lutheran, the top team from the Pacific Northwest and they were playing very well. We were pressured in doubles before winning at number one doubles in a tiebreaker to clinch the doubles point. We got a great effort from Brian Casey and Carlos Gonzales at three doubles as they dominated from the outset. Derek Fitzpatric set the tone in singles winning 6-2,6-1 at one singles and was followed by Nick Cunningham who also won in straight sets at two singles. Brian Casey had the match on his racket in the second set but his opponent faught back to force a deciding third set that Brian controlled throughout winning 6-0. The match was suspended with the score 4-1 with Danny Kim and Carlos Gonzales just preparing to start third sets. We showed some first round jitters but I am pleased to be heading to Indiana to begin play in the quarter finals at Depauw University on Friday May 18th. We will find out later today who we will be playing and I will forward that information as well as where we will be staying during the tournament. Special thanks do all the wonderful parents that made the trip to Santa Cruz and thanks to the Fity's for hosting the special mother's day dinner following the match. It was great to see some Slug Alums several of which were on championship teams that kept the old coach focused. I am sincerely appreciative for all the great support we receive, without which we would not be able to run this type of program, from the school, our parents, our supporters and fans. We are alive in our drive for five and will keep you all posted.

Best wishes to all, Bob and the Slugs

5/8/01 - UCSC to host NCAA Regionals

Dear Slug Fans,
We did finally get the official bid to host one of the two sites for the 2001 Western Regional NCAA National Tennis Championships on Friday and Saturday May 11 and 12. On Friday Pomona Pitzer, coached by former Slug member of the 1995 NCAA Championship team Ryan Witt, will play Pacific Lutheran at 1:00. The winner of this match will play UC Santa Cruz on Saturday at 1:00. Both matches will be played at the East Fieldhouse courts. We expect a good crowd and I would love to see as many of you as possible to send off our three great senior leaders. We are hoping this match will lead us to the final site which this year is in Indiana at Depauw University on May 18-20 for the team event and May 21-13 for the individual championships. The entire team is excited about the work ahead and feel ready for the many challenges we will face. This is a great year for Div lll tennis with tremendous balance across the country. The top seeds in each region are deep and talented and there are many other teams that could present challenges on a given day. I really like the character we have on this team and I feel that we can win at each spot in the lineup. If we can maintain our health, stay focused, and embrace the challenge we should be tough to beat. We look forward to our meeting with Jerry Lynch and appreciate all the care and support of our many fans. Please join us this Saturday and if you can't make it physically follow us on the web at GoSlugs.com.

Best wishes,
Bob Hansen and the Slugs

4/27/01 - Slugs Dominate Ojai Tournament

Dear Slug Fans,
What a great trip! We could not have done a better job as a team positioning ourselves for individual bids at Nationals as we stepped up at every opportunity throughout this great Ojai tournament. Brian Casey defeated the top Freshman in the region, JR Hall of Pomona Pitzer, in the first round by scores of 6-1,6-2. Brian showed his growth as a player and his tenacity in a well rounded effort. The top four Slugs also moved through the first round in relatively easy fashion with dominating effectiveness. In the second round the top three of Derek Fitzpatrick, Nick Cunningham and Danny Kim all advanced with straight set wins setting up key quarter final matchups. Derek, the top seed in the tournament, beat Redlands Freshman Brian Murphy 6-2, 7-6. Nick Cunningham drew Claremont's number one player who had beaten him in a close match earlier in the season and showed great maturity and poise in easily defeating him 6-2,6-3. It was great to see him figure out this matchup and learn from the prior match. Danny Kim faced Redland's number one player and one of the top players in the region. Danny's only Div lll loss of the season had come to this same player in the semi finals of the fall West Regional championships but this time Danny stepped up and defeated Steve Marshburn 6-3,6-3. With three Slugs in the semis we were assured of one finalist but Derek defeated veteran Chan Ly of Champman to assure an all Slug singles final. The other semi was a battle between Nick and Danny and it could have gone either way with Danny prevailing 4-6,7-6,6-2. The final was a beautiful match with Derek holding off 8 set points before prevailing 7-6, 6-1. It was some of the best quality Div lll tennis I have seen and I was a very proud coach. Many fans and coaches commented on the quality of the play and I was very pleased about our preparation and quality of play. In doubles the nations top team of Derek and Nick rolled through the top half of the draw without dropping a set. Danny and Peter Gladkin faced a tough draw and knowing they had to reach the final to be one of the top four teams in the region for NCAA selection purposes. After a three set victory in the first round they faced the second seeded team of Chan Ly and Cory Beachum in the quarter finals and prevailed 6-4,3-6,6-4. In the semi finals they faced Redlands top team of Marco Bravo and Rob Candiotty. Down a set and struggling they found a new gear and won the second set. In the third set they were down again 2-4 before breaking back on a great topspin lob and forcing a deciding tiebreaker. As we had all tournament we played our best under pressure and won the breaker 7-3. The final was a three set beauty with Nick and Derek coming back from down a set and a break to win 6-3 in the third. It was the last match on at this great tournament and many said it was the best of the day's doubles matches with great play from all four players. It was a coaches dream to see our players play so well under pressure, have so much fun, and handle themselves with such great class and integrity. Brian Casey and Carlos Gonzalez witnessed the great strength and resilient's of our veterans and were motivated to become the leaders of the next generation of Slug history. They were champions in the finest sense of the word and I am very proud of the effort from the entire team. We will be hosting regionals on May 11 and 12 Fri Sat and I will forward more details as they become available. Thanks to all our great tennis parents-Doug, Nina, Peter, Vicki, Rafael, and Lynn- for making the trip and supporting the team. Thanks again to Dr Warren Scott for keeping the team healthy. Great to see recruits Teige Sullivan who won the Ojai High School Doubles and Tim Mullane who also played the tournament. Three past Slug players who are now coaches, Ryan Witt at Pomona, Pat Henson at Marymount College and Lance Kronberg at Santa Barbara City College were at the tournament with their teams and it was great to see them enjoying coaching. It was a very great weekend for Slug Tennis and all of your help and support is greatly appreciated. The players reminded me that this is the fourth straight year that we have won both the singles and doubles in this great event. Congratulations to Slugs past and present. Sincerely, Coach Hansen and the Slugs

4/27/01 - Ojai Tournament This Weekend

Dear Slug Fans,
We are done with our dual match season ending with a loss to Santa Clara University making our record 12-5. We had another sterling performance by Freshman Brian Casey and battled hard at most spots in the line up. We are leaving today for Ojai which has a big impact on the selections of individuals for the NCAA tournament. We got a very good bid in having all three of our doubles team participate and all six of our singles players. The team really loves this event and we have done very well since the Div lll portion of the tournament was started several years ago. Ojai is the longest running tournament in the the country at the same site with a very rich 100 plus years of great play at this wonderful venue. For updated information and draws look on the web at ojaitourney.org. They post the matches soon after they are played so it is fun and possible to follow our progress. We play the first day, Friday at Moranda Park. The address is 200 Moranda Parkway in the town of Port Hueneme. The second day we play at Villanova School which is in the Ojai Valley at E Villanova Rd and N Ventura Ave. On the Ojai site there is directions to each site via map blaster. We are staying the first couple of nights at the Motel 6 in Ventura 805 643-5100. We will stay Saturday in the Valley at a yet to be determined site. All the teams that lose early will provide us with a place to stay! Hope to see some of you there and the rest can web surf your way along! Thanks again to the great work of Jerry Lynch keeping our minds and spirits in shape and to Warren Scott for keep our bodies in tact. As always thanks for the loving support of our parents and fans.

Talk to you soon. Bob Hansen and the Slugs

4/22/01 - Senior Day

Dear Slug fans,
It was not pretty but we got it done! The Slugs slimed the Cosacks 4-3 on senior day as we closed out our final dual match of the year. With Senior Derek Fitzpatrick battling the flu and sitting out of singles we were able to win three singles matches at number two with senior Danny Kim winning 6-3, 6-3 and at number three with Peter Gladkin playing one of his best singles matches of the year in winning 6-2,6-2 and the freshman rock Brian Casey winning at number four singles 6-1,6-2. UCSC won the doubles point by winning at number two doubles with Peter and Danny winning 8-5 and at three doubles with Brian and Carlos Gonzalez winning 8-6 after trailing 5-2. All three of our singles losses were in three sets as Nick Cunningham lost to one of the top Div ll players in the country Nestor Bernabe and Carlos and Jake Moya let first set wins slip. I was glad to see the seniors step up but I was unhappy with the lack of focus we showed is some spots. We play Santa Clara tomorrow, Monday, before preparing for Ojai next weekend. I will enclose some comments about our seniors for all to see and thanks to all who came to see the final home dual match of the year.

I'd like to say a few words about our five seniors. First of all this has been a very special year, in great part because of sharing it with these fine young men. They have all been leaders in this program and have, as a group, been a big part of our success. All have given a great deal to this program and have grown a great deal in the process. Their collective courage, compassion for each other, dedication, desire to excel and willingness to work have been a joy to be around. They have accomplished a lot. They have all been a part of two National Team Championships.

The first senior I would like to recognize is Brian Ebel. Brian has always distinguished himself with his hard work, willingness to deal with difficulty, and doing whatever necessary to contribute to the team's success. A wrist injury has kept him from playing late this season.

The next senior I would like to recognize is Jake Stevens our assistant coach. Besides playing his best tennis this season he has proven to be a hugh addition to the coaching staff with his compassion, drive and support. He has helped me in very significant ways to prepare this team and I am happy to say he might come back next season.

The next three seniors have all been honored as multiple time All-American selections. Peter went an entire year without losing a doubles match within our division, winning every dual match and tournament he played including two national doubles titles. Danny was the national Rookie of the Year and national Penn Player to watch. Derek is this year's Senior Player of the Year and currently ranked number one in the country in doubles and 3 in singles. They have accomplished a great deal. Above their accomplishments I would like to thank Peter for his sense of humor, willingness to be honest and forthright, and for challenging me to look at how I can best serve this team. I would like to thank Danny for his courage and love of the battle. His enthusiasm for this team and the game has been a real inspiration to everyone. I would like to thank Derek for his care and compassion for everyone in this program as well as his love of the game. He has never slowed in his desire to improve or his kindness to others. They will all be greatly missed but will always be a big part of my life and a big part of this program. Please join me in thanking these players and their families for their great contributions to Slug Tennis.

Best wishes, Bob Hansen and the Slugs

4/16/01 - Weekend UC Matches

Dear Slug Fans,

The Slugs had a wonderful and productive Easter weekend defeating two strong Division ll and fellow UC rival schools, UC San Diego and UC Davis. On Friday with Senior leader Danny Kim sidelined with a wrist injury we got strong performances up and down the lineup with great contributions from reserves Mark West in doubles and Jacob Moya in singles. The Tritons of UCSD came out strong in doubles by winning the doubles point with 9-7 wins at one and two doubles. Peter Gladkin and Mark West played very well before losing 9-7 to UCSD's top two singles players. At one doubles Derek Fitzpatrick and Nick Cunningham, coming off a win against the top ranked Div ll team in the country from Hawaii Pacific, battled back from a two break deficit to knot the match at 7 all before falling 9-7. At three doubles Brian Casey and Carlos Gonzalez showed continued improvement in beating a strong team 8-4. This was by far their best doubles effort to date and reflects their strong practice efforts. In singles Brian Casey evened the match with devastating performance at number four singles with a 6-0,6-1 victory over a local player from Aptos, Sean Higginbotham. Next off was Jacob Moya who beat Everett Schroeter 6-0, 7-5. Jacob let a 4-1 lead in the second set slip and faced a tough task as his opponent served for the set at 5-4. I was pleased to see Jacob reassert himself in winning the final three games showing great poise and character. At one singles Nick Cunningham beat a very good player, Sameer Chopra, in a tough three set battle 6-2,6-7,7-5 showing great creativity and fighting spirit. I don't think Nick had his best stuff working but won with tenacity, athletisism and will. At two singles Derek Fitzpatrick played a very solid a tacticly sound match in a close 7-6,6-3 victory over Michaael Meyer. Carlos Gonzales played one of his toughest singles matches of the year coming back after dropping the first set for a 6-7,6-1,6-2 victory over former UCSC player Cory Moderhak. I was very pleased to see Carlos win this match with his mental toughness. Peter Gladkin was our only singles player who lost but he played a brilliant first set before falling to a very good player, Jeff Wilson, also from Aptos 2-6,6-4,6-1. It was a great day with a large number of spectators to witness this 5-2 victory.

On Easter Sunday we played a rain make up against Division ll powerhouse UC Davis. They have a great lineup and we had a wonderful battle at every spot. UCSC won the doubles with victories at one and two doubles. Nick and Derek won easily at one with an 8-3 victory over Greg Lee and Yaro Vinogradsky. At two doubles Danny Kim was back in the lineup and he and partner Peter Gladkin defeated Payam Tabar and Creighton Macy 9-8 winning the deciding tiebreaker 7-0. Peter played very well and his return of serve was the deciding factor in the match. In singles all three of UCSC's victories came in three sets. At number two singles Nick Cunningham beat Yaro Vinogradsky 4-6,6-1,7-6 winning the deciding tiebreaker 7-0! Nick was very solid off the ground and did a great job taking charge of the match by playing further into the court in the last two sets. At five singles Brian Casey played another very solid match in winning 6-2,2-6,6-3 over a very experienced and talented player, Payam Tabar. Our final point came from Carlos Gonzalez who showed great character and poise by winning the final three games after his opponent served for the match at 5-4 in the third set. I was so pleased to see Carlos's continued development in his mental game as he was very calm and consistent in closing out the match. Danny Kim retired down 4-1 in the third with cramps after Carlos clinched the match. Derek Fitzpatrick showed great fight and very good movement at the net in coming back from a set and 2-5 down to extent the match to three sets. He lost 6-3,6-7,6-3 at one singles to Greg Lee. On the whole it was a tremendous match with everyone playing well and competing hard. Next up for the Slugs is UOP Wed April 18 in Stockton. We are back home Sun April 22 against Sonoma State University at 1:00. Thanks to Dr Warren Scott for his help with the whole team but especially Danny Kim. Special birthday cheer to Mary Cunningham. Nick gave a great birthday effort! Thanks to Tim and Jerry Mullane and Bryce and Duke Parmelly for coming up for visits and thanks to all the Slug fans for sharing these great matches with us.

Best wishes,
Bob Hansen and the Slugs

4/9/01 - Slugs Play Well in Loss to Div. Hawaii Pacific

Dear Slug Fans,

We had a wonderful match against Hawaii Pacific on Saturday April 7. Although we lost 6-3 we learned a great deal and positioned ourselves to win against a very good, highly ranked Div ll team. Their coach called to congradulate us and hopefully reschedule for next year saying that our team played courageously and he was very impressed with our doubles. Nick Cunningham and Derek Fitzpatrick are the top ranked team in Div lll tennis and they beat the number one ranked and previously undefeated Div ll team of Jan Tribler and Wojtek Bratek 8-4. Our return games were outstanding and with some work on holding more efficiently we will be tough to beat against anyone at one doubles. We played the best match of the year at three doubles with Brian Casey and Carlos Gonzalez defeating a very good team 8-4. They are getting more and more comfortable making adjustments and our work at the net was outstanding. Carlos served exceedingly well in the wind and supported Brian's serve very effectively. Brain is developing his net game in singles and doubles and is seeing the plays far earlier. In singles we had great efforts form everyone with super efforts from Derek at one singles in extending the number one singles player in the country to three sets, Danny Kim at three singles who also lost a close three setter where he served for the first set, and Brian Casey who won in three sets. Brian continues to show an amazing and consistent fighting spirit to compliment his steady baseline game. The addition of his improved play at the net has resulted in a well rounded singles approach that has left him with the best singles record on the team. Carlos Gonzalez looked in control early but hit a rough patch his opponent was able to capitalize on to win in two close sets. After his great doubles outing Nick Cunningham played well in singles despite having played sparingly recently due to arm problems.

Overall it was a great effort that will move us closer to being ready for the NCAA Team championship. Thanks to our fans and especially for the continued efforts of the Fitzpatrick's for bringing refreshments and special birthday wishes to Nina! We play this Friday against UCSD at 2:00 at the East Courts and Sunday against UC Davis at 1:00. Hope to see you there!

Best wishes, Coach Bob Hansen

4/4/01 - Upcoming Matches

Dear Slug Tennis Fans,

We have just played one match since spring break and we overpowered Westmont College of Santa Barbara 9-0. We looked strong at all spots and I was especially pleased with the continued improvement of our doubles teams. We sat out Nick Cunningham in singles to rest his arm and got a great singles effort from reserve Mark West as 6 singles. They, (Westmont), have had a very strong team in the past and now have their coach back after several years away from the program. I fully expect them to be stronger next time we face them. I would like to list our remaining matches in hopes that you will be able to see the team play. We are home against one of the top Div ll teams in the country, Hawaii Pacific, on Sat April 7th at 1:00. They are very good from top to bottom with a line up of all very experienced foreign players. A very good test! Next we play a much improved UC San Diego team on Friday April 13th at 1:30. They easily defeated Redlands this year and are now in Div ll. I look forward to a great match. On Sunday April 15, yes Easter Sunday, we play UC Davis in a rescheduled match at 1:00. We travel to Stockton on Wed April 18th to play a top 50 Div l team, U of Pacific. We are in Santa Cruz to play our final pre nationals home match against Sonoma State Sun April 22 at 1:00 and travel to Santa Clara on Monday April 23 to play Santa Clara U at 2:00. The Ojai Western Regionals on April 27-29 wrap up the regular season. This is a wonderful tournament in all regards and one we really look forward to. We face some real strong tests for the end of the regular season and will need to demonstrate the character of a championship team if we are to enter post season play healthy, confident and fully prepared.

Congratulations to the Slug women's tennis team for their win over Redlands. This is by far the most significant win in Dave's tenure as coach and it was fun to see the joy and satisfaction it brought to the entire team. I am reminded of how spoiled we have gotten as we beat the winners of the last two NCAA National Team tournaments on back to back days and it was business as usual. We are so fortunate to have the opportunities we have and I never want to lose sight of the day to day joy of meeting these great challenges. This year we are blessed with three seniors that have given so much to this program in Derek, Danny and Peter. I often think of how much they will be missed and make note to appreciate how much they mean to me and this program. There is something very special in winning a championship that is undeniable and a most worthy goal. It is something I want badly to share again with this team. The greater joy, by far, is definitely in the process each day. So often I hear the alumni speak of all the growth they experienced while here and how much in retrospect they could have learned if they had realized at the time what an incredible chance they had each day to participate fully in the process. My hope is to convey to this team that today is the best day of rest of their lives and to enjoy and benefit from it fully. I am very lucky to have many such players on this years team and it makes them very enjoyable to work with.

We have had a great season so far winning the first ever Div lll ITA National Indoor Championship, having a great Spring Break trip, and looking forward to the remainder of the season. Thank to all our great Slug tennis fans and I will keep you posted as we continue out Drive for Five!

Best wishes, Bob Hansen

3/26/01 - Road Trip Successful

Dear Slug Tennis Fans,
We just returned from a wonderful spring break trip where we played the past two NCAA Team National Champions on back to back days! Overall we played six matches in six days and took some hugh strides towards becoming a championship team. Because of several rainouts and a thin schedule we came into this week of matches having not played an official match since winning the National Indoor Team Championships almost a month earlier. We showed some rust coming off this layoff and finals and dropped our opening match to NAIA power Azusa Pacific 6-3. It was a tough match and revealed some areas which needed attention. Carlos Gonzalez had the best singles outing of them match winning at 6 singles 6-3,6-3. Overall we played without our characteristic enthusiasm and desire and felt like we had to refocus for the matches ahead. Day two we played Pomona Pitzer coached by former Slug Ryan Witt and we responded with a far more focused and passionate effort in defeating Pomona 7-0. It was great to see three former NCAA champion Slugs in Ryan Witt, Bryan Shapiro and Jai Nettimi, all members of the 1995 Championsip team. Day three pitted us against longtime rival Redlands University. In a very close 4-3 match the Slugs suffered their first regular season Div lll loss in eleven years. We lost the doubles point by losing two and three doubles and could only manage wins by Nick Cunningham at 2 singles, Danny Kim at 3 singles and Brian Casey at 5 singles. It was definitely a bitter defeat as we feel strongly that we could win at several of the spots where we struggled. I have often been asked during this streak if it might not have been better to have lost somewhere during the season in any of the past years. I now know that at least this year it may turn out to be a blessing in disguise as we seemed to grow stronger and more focused from this setback. Day four we faced a great team in Williams College the 1999 NCAA champions. Again we failed to win the doubles point winning only at 2 doubles with Danny Kim and Peter Gladkin playing one of their best matches of the season. Derek Fitzpatric and Nick Cunningham, the number one ranked team in the country, suffered their first loss of the year and we continued to struggle at 3 doubles. Facing the daunting task of winning four singles against a very fine lineup we greeted the challenge in championship form! Derek Fitzpatric started things rolling with a 6-2, 6-3 win at two singles followed closely by Peter Gladkin at four singles and Brian Casey at five singles. Brian Casey defeated a player ranked in the top 80 in the country with one of his finer efforts of the year. Peter bounced back from a tough match at Redlands with an impressive display of fine all court play. Derek responded with a great job of competing following a very rough outing at Redlands. Nick Cunningham lost a hard faught match against one of the best players in the county at number one singles to close the match score to UCSC 3 Williams 2. With Danny Kim and Carlos Gonzalez in third sets and needing one point to clinch the match, the battle was on. With both players up early breaks I felt we were headed for victory. As is often the case, things turned in a hurry as Carlos lost 6-4 in the third and Danny faced two match points at 4-5 and five-fourty. In his typical warrior style Danny elevated his game and came back to hold serve. After a well played game to break serve Danny got another test in his attempt to serve out the match. His opponent lifted his game and held off two match points before having a break point to send the match to a final set breaker. Danny came up with another big serve and winning volley to set up his third match point. The game plan was to attack the backhand and on match point Danny crushed a forehand approach to the forehand corner to seal the deal. A great match with fine efforts up and down the lineup! Day five brought 2000 NCAA Champions Trinity University of Texas. We finally got a great effort from all our doubles teams and swept the doubles. It was great to see Brian Casey and Carlos Gonzales lift their games and play like I know they can. They are the youngest of our teams and improve in bits and spurts with each match. In this match they dominated 8-1! Peter and Danny also stepped up and won easily at two doubles 8-3. Derek and Nick played solidly to win 8-6 at one doubles. In singles we got some superlative efforts. Brian Casey missed maybe two balls in his match and dominated completely from all parts of the court posting a 6-0,6-0 win. Nick Cunningham beat a player he lost to at last years NCAA tournament winning at two singles 6-1,6-2. Peter Gadkin was very solid and controlled his match winning 6-2,6-2. Derek Fitzpatrick defeated last years NCAA singles finalist 2-6, 7-5, 6-2 fighting off one match point and showing great resilience and fortitude under fire. Carlos Gonzalez played one great set and yet had trouble holding his level in the third and deciding set. It is great to get glimpses of his potential as he works to hold his level over longer periods of time. Danny Kim's match was called at one set apiece. It was truly a dominate performance against a great team and showed character and strength to play this hard on the fifth day of the trip. We concluded the trip with a strong 6-1 win against Claremont with another strong performance in singles and doubles. In addition to the great work done on court we did some very significant team building work and goal setting that will benefit us during the stretch run. Much thanks to Jerry Lynch and Rolland Todd for their wonderful work in guiding the team and helping me to be a better coach. Special thanks to Peter and Vicki Gladkin and Bryan Shapiro for the wonderful meals and hospitality. Thanks for sharing your time, love, and interest. Thanks also to Rafael Gonzalez and Doug and Nina Fitzpatrick for all your support and help. It was great to see Johnny Kim, Tanya, Palmer Taylor, and Gary Liekin. Special thanks to assistant coach Jake Stevens for all his great work and support. Finally great work to the team for having the courage to truly face challenges with class, courage, openness and hard work.
We are on our way!

Best wishes to you all and thanks for your support,
Bob Hansen and the Slugs

3/15/01 - Lull in Schedule

Dear Slug Tennis Fans,

Sorry there has been such a long time between updates but we have not had a real match since winning the National Indoors. We have hit a lull in the schedule and have had several matches which needed to be rescheduled due to inclement weather. We played a practice match against Foothill College with several players out for academic and injury reasons and played very well. Carlos Gonzalez and Brian Casey moved up to two doubles and dominated a match against a fairly tough team. They are moving better and improve with each match. Senior Brian Ebel and junior Jake Moya won both their singles and doubles matches as did veterans Derek Fitzpatrick and Danny Kim. Derek defeated friend and hopefully future Slug Brian Martinez in a very well played match.

We had a wonderful meeting with our sports psychologist Jerry Lynch that proved to be very powerful and instrumental in keeping us focused and on track. I will attach the notes from the meeting as I am sure some of the veterans would enjoy some "Jerry Lovin" if even from a second hand account. He has a tremendous new book out called "Creative Coaching" that is now at the stores.

We are facing a very challenging (some might say foolhearty) spring break where we will play six matches in six days. We open with Azusa Pacific on Tuesday at 3:15 at a club near their school. On Wednesday we face Pomona Pitzer coached by former Slug sensation Ryan Witt at Pomona at 2:00. On Wednesday we play the U of Redlands at Redlands at 2:00 and come back the next day to play Williams College at 9:30 at Claremont College. Next up will be the defending NCAA champions Trinity University whom we will play at Claremont at 2:00. We conclude our matches against Claremont College Sunday at 10:00. If any of you can join us it would be a pleasure to see you and there should be some great tennis. I have a great deal of faith in the mental and emotional strength of our team and feel strongly that this is the kind of challenge that will bring the best out of them. We will work hard to be prepared for each match and will have plenty of motivation to establish ourselves as a championship caliber team. The type of courage, team unity and character it will take to perform consistently on a trip like this will tell us alot about who we are and what type of a team we are becoming.

Thanks as always for your wonderful support and I hope your thoughts will be with us as we head south for our spring break trip. I will give you all a detailed account when we return. If anyone would like to be taken off this list please send a return email and I will remove your name. We will return home to freshly resurfaced courts which will be great to prepare on for the NCAA tournament!

Our Spring Break matches begins on Tuesday, March 20th and we will be staying at the Claremont Inn. Phone number is 909 626-2411.
Stay tuned!

Best wishes to all,
Bob Hansen

2/19/01 - UCSC wins ITA Indoor Championship

Dear Slug Tennis fans,

We just returned from a tremendous weekend where the Slugs won the first ever ITA National Div lll Team Indoor Championships!

Hosted beautifully by Whitman College in Walla Walla Washington the event was a resounding success. With the top five teams in the country invited it was a great opportunity to see where we stand early in the season. We played host Whitman College in the first round as we entered the tournament as the number three seeded team. In only our second match of the season the entire team played well in sweeping the match without the loss of a set. At number one singles senior Derek Fitzpatrick defeated the top player in the Northwest and #22 nationally ranked singles player Tim Mullen 6-1,6-4. Brian Ebel played well and won at #6 singles 6-3,6-0.

The win over Whitman put us in the semifinals against last year's NCAA finalist and number two seed Gustavus Adolphus. The last time UCSC lost the doubles point to a Div lll team was in 1996 in the semi finals of the NCAA tournament. This match was also against a strong team from Gustavus and this year we again found ourselves down one nothing going into singles as we lost at number two and three doubles. USCS's number one team of Derek Fitzpatrick and Nick Cunningham showed why they are the number one ranked team in the country in posting a 8-4 win. Played on a four court facility the top four players took the courts. With three seniors and a junior in our top four we looked to try to wrestle the match back in our favor in these first four. One of our best fighters, Danny Kim, evened the score at 1-1 with a quick two-set victory at #3 singles with a strong 6-3,6-2 performance against Mike Hom. Both Nick Cunningham and Peter Gladkin lost first sets in tiebreakers at #2 and #4 singles while Derek Fitzpatrick won a hard faught tiebreaker at #1 singles. Nick and Peter battled back to win the second sets to force 10 point match tiebreakers for the third sets. Because of tournament time constraints all third sets in singles were played in this 10 point tiebreaker format. Unfortuneately for the Slugs both Peter and Nick lost these breakers putting us down 3-1 and needing to win all three of the remaining matches. Derek won the second set 6-1 to leave the match in the hands of Freshmen Brian Casey and Sophmore Carlos Gonzalez. Brian fought off two set points in the first to post a 7-5 win while Carlos got out to a great start winning his first set 6-4 against a very good veteran singles player Daryn Collins. After going up in the second Brian Casey was broken and forced into a tiebreaker for the second set. Losing the breaker forced a third set breaker which started just as Carlos was fighting to stay in the second set. Carlos lost the second set and started his breaker as Brian was half way through his. With the match riding on these final tiebreakers at 12:45 am Brian Casey raised the level of his play and played a very fine breaker to even the match with a 10-8 margin of victory. At this point Carlos was down 4-1 in his breaker. The Gustavus coach had earlier said that this was the best competitor on his team and things looked bleak. Carlos responded by playing some consistently solid tennis and wrestled the match from his opponent in dramatic fashion by a final margin of 10-7 on a wicked first serve! The team was so relieved and pleased to see our rookie singles players step up against very tough competition in a very pressure packed setting. Their poise and fight was a pleasure to watch and made us feel good about our preparation thus far.

Emory University coached by former Slug John Browning blasted top seed and defending NCAA Champion Trinity University in the other semifinal to set up a match that the two coaches predicted 10 years ago. I was very impressed with his team and looked forward to a great battle in the final. After dropping third doubles 8-4 it fell on the veteran teams of Danny Kim and Peter Gladkin and Nick Cunningham and Derek Fitzpatrick to win the doubles point. Down the whole match Danny and Peter won their point winning a breaker 7-4 to even the match. With Nick serving 7-8 duce the pressure was on. After two great serve the doubles point was decided with a great tiebreaker that Nick and Derek showed again why they are the top ranked team in the country with poise and strength under extreme pressure winning 7-4. In single Peter Gladkin set the tone with an great display of smart attacking tennis as he broke down the great defense of his opponent in a 6-3, 6-2 win at #4 singles. Nick and Danny each won hard faught first sets and were closing in on match points at the same time. Danny, doing his Patrick Rafter imitation, forced the action from the net with great success and Nick serving hugh and looking to get in off penetrating ground strokes won their matches within seconds of each other setting off a great celebration!

It was a wonderful addition to Slug tennis history to win the first ever National Indoor Team Championship. I could not be more proud of the heart and character we showed and I feel strongly that they grew a great deal from the experience. We still have a long way to go but we are off to a great start. Special thanks to Raphael Gonzalez for making the trip to Walla Walla after finding out that we were in the finals at 1:30 am. Your great cheer and support is greatly appreciated. And also special thanks to the Fitzpatricks, Doug, Nina, and Doug Jr and Brea for welcoming us home with banners at the airport. Your love and support once again was overwhelming and a great way to end a long but fantastic weekend. Thanks again for all your support and I will keep you all posted.

Best wishes,
Coach Hansen

Media Archive

• 5/26/01 - Josh Nagel: UCSC senior Fitzpatrick ends college career with whirlwind turn of events - Santa Cruz Sentinel
• 5/21/01 - UC-Santa Cruz falls to Williams of Massachusetts, 4-1 in title match - Santa Cruz Sentinel
  
• 5/20/01 - NCAA Men’s Tennis: Slugs advance to final - Santa Cruz Sentinel
  
• 5/17/01 - NCAA tennis: Familiar pace, new role for Slugs - Santa Cruz Sentinel
  
• 5/13/01 - UCSC tennis team goes to finals - Santa Cruz Sentinel
  
• 2001 Ojai Valley Tennis Tournament
  
• 4/23/01 - Seniors step it up for ‘Slug Tennis’ - Santa Cruz Sentinel
  
• 3/31/01 - UCSC 9, Westmont 0 - Santa Cruz Sentinel
• 3/24/01 - UCSC 4, Williams 3 - Santa Cruz Sentinel
• 12/5/00 - Hansen named Coach of the Decade by the ITA
• 10/22/00 - UCSC Team Advances - Santa Cruz Sentinel
• 10/21/00 - UCSC wins doubles title - Santa Cruz Sentinel
• 2000 NCAA Championships

• 2001 Men's Tennis Championships in Greencastle, Indiana
  • NCAA Championships