No. 7 Virginia competing at ITA National Team Indoor Championship

Courtesy UVA Media Relations

The No. 7 Virginia men’s tennis team (5-0) travels to Champaign, Ill., to compete at the 46th annual ITA Division I National Men’s Team Indoor Championship Presented by Oracle, Friday through Sunday, Feb. 12-14, at the Atkins Tennis Center.

Virginia will play in the opening match of the tournament on Friday, Feb. 12, taking on three-seed TCU at 10 a.m. ET.

The 46th annual ITA Division I National Men’s Team Indoor Championship Presented by Oracle showcases eight of the top men’s Division I teams in the three-day tournament to crown an indoor national champion.

Seven of the eight teams in the field earned a spot by advancing out of four-team ITA Kickoff Weekend regionals. Illinois earned an automatic berth as the host institution.

Participating schools: No. 1 Southern California, No. 2 North Carolina, No. 3 TCU, No. 4 Baylor, No. 5 Texas, No. 7 Virginia, No. 10 Tennessee, Illinois.

This year’s field has been halved from the usual 16 teams to just eight, and the four-day tournament shortened to three days.

Each team will play three matches in either the championship or consolation bracket. The championship final is scheduled for Sunday at 6:30 p.m.

Men’s Tennis Notes

• The Cavaliers have won six ITA National Team Indoor Championships, including four-straight from 2008 to 2011 and most recently in 2017 when the tournament was held in Charlottesville. Only Stanford (12) and UCLA (7) have won more team indoor titles
• Virginia earned a spot in the tournament with a 4-1 upset-win over then-ranked No. 3 Ohio State in Columbus, Ohio. Virginia was originally the No. 4 seed in Columbus, but No. 3 seed Texas Tech dropped out. Middle Tennessee State was added to the four-team pod, bumping UVA up to the No. 3 seed and changing the first-round opponent to Iowa instead of Ohio State. UVA blanked Iowa 4-0 in the opener
• Virginia was ranked No. 22 in the preseason ITA team rankings, but has risen to No. 7 after the win over the Buckeyes and a decisive 5-2 win over No. 14 Wake Forest last week in Charlottesville
• Virginia is 5-0 to start the season for the first time since 2017 when it went 17-0 to start the year
• Virginia ended the shortened 2020 campaign winning its last six matches, giving it an 11-match win streak heading into the weekend
• Two freshmen have started their careers with perfect records in singles: Jeffrey von der Schulenburg (Zurich, Switzerland) is 5-0 this season, playing on courts 2-4, and Iñaki Montes (Pamplona, Spain) is 4-0 while also alternating in the lineup between courts 2-4
• Grad student Carl Söderlund (Stockholm, Sweden) played on UVA’s 2017 National Team Indoor champion squad. He played three-singles in the tournament. Three of his matches were abandoned, but he did have a dominant 6-2, 6-1 win over UNC’s Simon Soendergaard in the semifinals to send UVA to the championship match against Ohio State
• Söderlund is 2-0 in singles this season (with two abandoned matches). He is ranked No. 29 in the ITA rankings
  Virginia is 4-1 all-time against TCU, including a 4-1 victory last season in Charlottesville when the Cavaliers were unranked and the Horned Frogs were No. 11. TCU’s last win over UVA came in 2004