By Jerry Hill
Baylor Bear Foundation

With five of the Big 12 Conference's six men's tennis teams ranked in the top 16 nationally, Baylor coach Matt Knoll says "we're kind of in the same ballpark" as 2015, when the league produced three of the four NCAA semifinalists.

"That's just where the Big 12 is," said Knoll, whose third-ranked Bears (19-3) will open conference play with a matchup against No. 16 Oklahoma (12-8) at 6 p.m. Friday at the Hurd Tennis Center. "Everybody we play is going to be great, and that's going to help us."

Last year, the Bears started out the season ranked fourth, dropped to as low as 45th and ended up 32nd after a first-round upset of Florida State. In a reversal, they were 22nd in this year's preseason poll ÃÆ' ¢Ãƒ ¢' ¬" "which is the lowest we've been in memory," Knoll said ÃÆ' ¢Ãƒ ¢' ¬" and climbed to No. 3 this week.

Knoll said he wasn't sure if the Bears were the third-best team, but "you don't get there in a computer formula unless you have the wins. And we've got the wins."

"To be honest, it's been kind of fun to climb and come from behind and go forward," he said. "Where I think last year we started at 4 and worked our way down. We had some adversity last year. This is a real young team, and that's been fun for me. It's been really different. They do a lot of things that young teams do, but their hearts are in the right place and they compete really well for each other and the university."

In the latest ITA individual rankings, sophomore Juan Benitez is ranked 10th, followed by senior Max Tchoutakian at No. 41 and sophomores Johannes Schretter and Jimmy Bendeck at Nos. 74 and 120, respectively.

Benitez, who's been ranked as high as fifth, is 30-3 overall, 15-3 in dual matches and 9-3 versus ranked opponents and has won five in a row.

"Juan's the real deal," Knoll said. "Juan has some legitimate weapons, he has a passion for the game, he has an aptitude to work ÃÆ' ¢Ãƒ ¢' ¬" a lot of the same qualities you see in our great guys. He's got some things in his game that he's really got to improve if he's going to be successful at the next level, but I think he wants to play at the next level and he's tracking in that direction. I'm very confident he's going to be able to do that."

After sitting out last year, Benitez said a win over Tchoutakian in the Sherwood Cup finals back in January gave him the confidence that he could play the No. 1 singles position for the Bears.

"Baylor has a really strong history for having strong No. 1s, like Benjamin Becker, Julian Lenz," Benitez said. "I've been working really hard just to keep that a Baylor thing. If you play No. 1 for Baylor, you're going to have to step up and show your strengths and just be dominant. And that's what I've been working on."

Baylor has dropped the doubles point in eight of its 22 dual matches this season, including last Sunday's 4-2 win at Tulsa. But five times, the Bears have rallied to win it in singles.

"We've had some issues with doubles lately, but we don't make a big deal of it," said Benitez, who is ranked 29th in doubles with redshirt sophomore Will Little, "because we have six really good singles players."

Like Oklahoma, Baylor's had some injury issues of late as well. Redshirt freshman Bjoern Petersen has been out two months with a stress fracture and freshman Constantin Frantzen had to sit out the Tulsa match.

"Now, you're down to your eighth player, and that makes the match a lot closer," Knoll said.

The Sooners started out 8-1 and were ranked as high as fourth, but they've lost five in a row and seven of their last 11. They opened conference play last season, falling to then-No. 6 Texas (4-3) and No. 16 TCU (4-0).

Even without Harris, OU has a trio of ranked players with junior Spencer Papga and seniors Alex Ghilea and Florin Bragusi at Nos. 20, 52 and 82, respectively. They've been lineup mainstays for an OU program that has lost in the NCAA finals each of the last three years.

"They've had some adversity, some injuries, so they haven't played quite as well lately," Knoll said. "But, they've got a lot of experienced guys that have been tough for us over the years. . . . Anytime you've got a team that's been to the finals three years in a row, you know they've got something going on there."

Baylor will host No. 8 Oklahoma State (18-4, 1-1) at 2 p.m. Sunday. The Cowboys knocked off No. 6 Texas, 4-2, last Sunday after dropping their conference opener to TCU, 4-0.

OSU has a trio of ranked singles players in No. 27 Julian Cash, No. 80 Arjun Kadhe and No. 84 Lucas Gerch and a doubles tandem of Kadhe and Cash that's ranked No. 5.

The first 200 fans at Friday's match against OU will receive free T-shirts and hot dogs, with 200 T-shirts handed out Sunday. Live scoring, video streaming and an in-match blog for both matches are available at www.baylorbears.com.