Oct. 19, 2005

WACO, Texas - The Baylor men's tennis team will send four members to the ITA Regional Championships in College Station, Texas this weekend to compete for a spot in the National Intercollegiate Indoor Championships. Action will kick off tomorrow with finals on Sunday.

Baylor's Michal Kokta, Matt Brown, Jon Reckewey and Matija Zgaga will compete in the singles bracket and the teams of Kokta/Brown and Reckewey/Zgaga will compete for the doubles title. In singles, the two players who reach the finals will qualify for the National Indoors while in doubles, only the top team will earn a spot at the indoors.

The ITA National Intercollegiate Indoor Championships will be hosted by Ohio State University at the Racquet Club of Columbus November 3-6 in Columbus, Ohio. Lars Poerschke has already qualified for the tournament by reaching the finals in the Polo Ralph Lauren All American Championships in Tulsa.

In other action this weekend, Baylor's Vladimir Portnov, Poerschke and Will Ward will remain in Waco to compete in a futures professional tournament. The three will compete in the qualifying draws starting on Saturday at the Baylor Tennis Center with main draw action beginning Tuesday, Oct. 25 and running through Sunday, Oct. 30.

This marks the second pro-tournament for Portnov and Ward. Last weekend, the two traveled to Arlington along with Zgaga for a similar futures pro tournament. Portnov defeated teammate Zgaga and USA's Marcus Fugate before falling to Justin Slattery of the U.S. in third round qualifying action.

Ward has won three qualifying matches defeating Manuel Gonzalez, Chris Lam and Stuart Waters, all of the U.S. Ward will now face Philip Gubenco of Canada in main draw action today at 1 p.m.

Results for action this weekend will be posted at www.baylorbears.com.