Men's Tennis Makes 12th NAIA National Championships Appearance
KANSAS CITY, Mo. – The National Association of Intercollegiate Athletics has announced the 24-team field for the 64th annual NAIA Men's Tennis National Championship. The Bethany College men's team earned an at-large bid to make the tournament.
The Swedes, who are ranked 14th in the final NAIA Men's Tennis Coaches' Poll, made the tournament as the 8th at-large bid. The field consists of 14 automatic berths, 9 at-large selections and one host berth. Automatic qualification is given to conference and unaffiliated grouping tournament champions.
Bethany went through the regular season winning all nine of their duals, and going 7-0 in the KCAC. The Swedes beat Southwestern 5-0 in the first round of the KCAC tournament, but lost 5-3 to (24) McPherson College in the championship.
After a long wait, head coach Tony Swiantek was relieved to hear his team had made it, "We held our breath for a while, so it was a great feeling to see that the raters kept us in the top 15 in the nation. We are packing our bags and heading to Mobile!"
Manuel Raga was named the KCAC Player of the Year for the second year in a row. He is a perfect 9-0 in the No. one singles position and is 10-2 in the No. one doubles position. Raga was the unanimous Player of the Year in the league and First Team All-KCAC.
Swiantek was named the KCAC Co-Coach of the Year and Bruno Campos was the KCAC Newcomer of the Year. Campos, a freshman from Rio de Janeiro, Brazil won 10 of his 11 singles matches. In doubles, Campos won 10 of his 12 matches. Along with being the Newcomer of the Year, Campos was a Second Team All-KCAC member.
Juan Mateus and Michiel Van Den Bogaert were also voted First Team All-KCAC award winners. Matues was a unanimous First Team All-KCAC member, while Van Den Bogaert was named to the first team after being a second team member last season. Both Mateus and Van Den Bogaert went 10-0 in singles matches. Mateus went 8-2 with his partner Campos in doubles, while Van Den Bogaert teamed with Raga to go 9-1 in doubles.
The event will be held at the Mobile Tennis Center in Mobile, Ala., from May 12-16, for the 12th-consecutive year. The official national championship seeds and bracket will be announced later today.
To read the NAIA release of men's national qualifiers, click here.
To see the final rankings, click here.