The Oregon men’s tennis team ended its fall season by winning the most matches at the Duck Invitational last weekend.
The Ducks won 16 matches (14 singles, two doubles) to beat out Boise State by one.
“We did a great job in this tournament, and we needed to get this kind of experience under our belt,” head coach Chris Russell said.
Five of the six Ducks who participated Sunday contributed singles wins. Junior Jason Menke finished with four singles victories to lead Oregon.
“Jason is using his experience right now to help the team,” Russell said. “He is showing great leadership.”
Sophomores Chris King and Greg Dubourdieu won three and two matches, respectively, for the Ducks.
Oregon’s freshmen also contributed heavily to the team success. Kyle Halberg won two singles matches and Johan Paalberg won three — two on the first day.
“Our younger guys did especially well,” Russell said. “They are applying the skills that we are teaching in practice, and they are getting the results.”
One area of concern for Russell following the tournament was their play in doubles matches.
“We didn’t play very well in our doubles matches, and we need to work on that,” Russell said. “Teamwork will be so important when we start up the regular season.”
The doubles teams of Menke and Martin Pawlowski, and Halberg and Dubourdieu were the only doubles teams to win for the Ducks.
The schools participating in the tournament include Portland, Portland State, Texas A&M, Boise State and Nebraska.
“The level of competition in this tournament was pretty high,” Russell said. “Portland and Boise State had some guys ranked nationally in the top 100.”
Russell said the team still needs to step it up a notch before the Pacific-10 season opens in February.
“We played Martin against some of the tougher players in this tournament so he could get the experience he’ll need before our Pac-10 matches,” Russell said. “Right now he has the physical talents to compete, but needs to get mentally tougher.”
The Ducks will break from team practice in a couple of weeks for the upcoming winter vacation. Oregon gets back to the court against Northern Arizona on Jan. 25.