Sept. 11, 2003

MEMPHIS, Tenn. - The University of Memphis men's tennis team kicked off its 2003-04 season at 12:30 p.m., Thursday, when they loaded into a van and hit I-240 heading for Murfreesboro, Tenn. The Tigers will be one of 13 teams participating in the 17th Annual Middle Tennessee Fall Invitational, which begins play Friday.

Senior Lee Taylor Walker (Jackson, Tenn./Univ. School of Jackson) is seeded No. 6 in the Flight One singles draw, receiving a first-round bye before facing the winner of the Anant Sitaram (Middle Tennessee)/Tomas Gonzalez (SIU) match at 11:30 a.m., Friday.

Junior Alex Bucewicz (Melbourne, Australia/Salesian), who led the Tigers with a 26-6 singles mark at No. 4 singles last year, will be looking to extend his 12-match winning streak that ended the 2002-03 campaign. Bucewicz will face Tennessee Tech's Will Chappell at 9:30 a.m., Friday, in his opening match.

A trio of Tigers will begin their careers in the Flight Two Singles competition. Martin Tamla, Mark Finnegan and James Spence will all play opening round matches at 8:30 a.m., Friday. Tamla will face UALR's Dave Baxendine. Finnegan will face freshman Tom Green from Georgia Southern, a player who is replacing Finnegan's absence in the Georgia Southern roster after Finnegan transferred to Memphis over the summer. Spence will start his collegiate career with a match against Diago Fernandez from UT-Chattanooga.

The remainder of the squad will compete in the Flight 3 singles competition. Walk-on Trey Brower will start his Tiger career with a 9:30 a.m. match against Walter Whitmire from UALR, Friday. Andrew Olswing, who walked on with the team last year and made the roster, starts his second season as a Tiger against UALR's Nihal Advani. Alex Jago, who is in his second semester after joining the Tigers in January, starts his sophomore season of eligibility at 10 a.m. against Lindsey Wilson College's Adrian Arroyave.

The Tigers will have four doubles teams in action at the tournament as Memphis lost players off all three of its top three doubles teams from 2002-03. Bucewicz and Tamla will start their doubles play at 4 p.m., Friday, against the duo of Greg Sossaman and Jens Pilgram-Larsen from Vanderbilt. The other Tiger duo in the Flight 1 doubles draw will be Walker and Spence. That duo will face the Georgia Southern team of Doruk Baglan and Green at 4 p.m. Friday as well.

In Flight Two doubles, the lone Tiger entry has already received a first-round bye, as Finnegan and Jago will not open doubles play until Saturday, where they will face the winner of the Lukasz Sosawa/ Bojan Illievski (SIU) vs. Jarrad Bunt/Mithun Murali (UALR) match.

Memphis' lone entry in the Flight Three doubles will be the duo of Tiger walk-ons Olswing and Brower. At 4 p.m., Friday, that team will take on the Austin Peay State duo of Nabil Lababedi and Marcos Queiroz in the first quarterfinal matches.

The tournament will be played at the Buck Bouldin Tennis Center on the Middle Tennessee State University grounds. All Flight One Singles and Doubles will be played on the blue courts, while the Flight Three singles will be played on the green courts. There will be a first-round consolation draw for all singles divisions, and all consolation matches will begin play, Saturday. The third set in all back-draw matches and all Flight Three singles matches, will play a super tiebreaker in the third set and all doubles flights are playing pro sets. Should weather turn bad for the outdoor courts, the tournament will be moved inside. For tournament updates, you can also go to www.goblueraiders.com for updated results.