Jan. 23, 2015 
Live Scoring | 
Live Blog | Tournament Central
WACO, Texas - The sixth-ranked Baylor men's tennis team will host three ranked teams at the Hurd Tennis Center this weekend as part of the ITA Kick-Off Weekend.
Playing in its second dual-match of the season, the Bears face No. 61 Tulane Saturday at noon. Following that contest, 40th-ranked Drake and No. 52 Miami, will play at the Hurd Tennis Center at 3 p.m.
The losers of Saturday's two matches will play on Sunday at noon and the winners will face off at 3 p.m. The winner of two matches in Waco will be one of 15 teams to advance to the ITA National Team Indoor Championships in Chicago, Ill., Feb. 13-16.
"It is going to be a great weekend of tennis," head coach Matt Knoll said. "We are excited to play outdoors again. We have three good teams coming in and I know we are excited to get out there and compete. I think we got a lot out of the Illinois match. I think our guys will really respond well."
Despite winning the doubles point and taking a 3-1 lead, BU was unable to close out a season-opening win over No. 11 Illinois, falling 4-3 on Wednesday at the Hawkins Indoor Tennis Center.
The Bears' lineup features the country's fifth-ranked singles player in junior Julian Lenz. Senior Tony Lupieri is ranked No. 26, while junior Felipe Rios is No. 121. Meanwhile in doubles, Rios and Lupieri team together to form the country's 13th-ranked tandem.
BU is 3-2 all-time against Tulane, including a 3-1 mark under Knoll. Baylor last played the Green Wave in 2001 in the first round of the NCAA Championships with Tulane taking a 4-2 win in Fort Worth.
Tulane enters the weekend with a 3-0 record on the season. The Green Wave are led by the country's ninth-ranked singles player in Dominik Koepfer.
The tournament's No. 2 seed, Drake, has a 2-0 mark on the season, including a 5-2 upset of No. 39 Louisville in its last match out. The Bulldogs have two ranked singles players, No. 30 Ben Lott and No. 46 Alen Salibasic.
Miami, the event's No. 3 seed, comes into the weekend with a 1-1 record and following a 4-3 loss to No. 70 UCF. The Hurricanes have one ranked singles player in 56th-ranked Piotr Lomacki.
Baylor has competed in and hosted the ITA Kick-Off Weekend in four of the six years of its existence, winning all eight matches and advancing to the national event each year.
Live scoring and a live blog will be available during the matches this weekend on BaylorBears.com with a complete recap to follow each BU match. To stay up-to-date with the team all season follow @BaylorMTennis on Twitter.
