#4 (NCAA DIII) Case Western Reserve (8-1) at
UC Irvine (7-4)
Date: Tuesday, March 12
Time: 1 p.m. (PDT)
Location: Anteater Tennis Stadium - Irvine, Calif.

#6 Columbia (9-2) at
UC Irvine (7-4)
Date: Friday, March 15
Time: 10 a.m. (PDT)
Location: Anteater Tennis Stadium - Irvine, Calif.

Match Notes

IRVINE, Calif. - UC Irvine men's tennis continues its four-match homestand this week starting against Case Western Reserve on Tuesday, March 12. First serve is set for 1 p.m. at Anteater Tennis Stadium. UCI will then host sixth-ranked Columbia in a 10 a.m. showdown on Friday, March 15.
 
QUICK HITS
• The 'Eaters will be looking to continue their perfect start at home where they are 6-0.
• UCI will face two top-10 teams this week as Case Western is fourth (NCAA DIII) and Columbia is sixth in the nation.
• UC Irvine plays six of its eight matches in the month of March in the friendly confines of Anteater Tennis Stadium.
• Noah Zamora, who has won four in a row, is tops on the squad with seven singles victories, playing at Nos. 2-4.
• Last week, Zamora earned straight-set wins at No. 3 against 31st-ranked UCLA and at No. 2 vs. Weber State.
• Lawee Sherif, Hiroki Sakagawa and Enrique Luque Rico are tied for second on the team with six singles wins apiece.
• Sherif and Sakagawa have both won their last five decisions.
• UCI won the Big West tournament in 2022 and secured a share of the Big West regular-season title in 2023.
• The Anteaters have seven returning letterwinners, and all seven are upperclassmen.
• Each of their four All-Big West selections from a year ago are back for another season.
• In their Division I history, the 'Eaters have made 12 NCAA Tournament appearances.
• They have placed first in the Big West standings 17 times and won four Big West Tournament titles.
• UC Irvine has been named an ITA All-Academic Team (minimum 3.2 team GPA) in each of the last seven years.
 
LAST TIME OUT
UC Irvine swept Weber State, 7-0, last Saturday at Anteater Tennis Stadium. The two sides played a tough doubles point with the Wildcats taking the early advantage after a 6-3 win at No. 1. Andy Nguyen and Hiroki Sakagawa brought the 'Eaters even with a 6-4 victory over Connor Kruger/William Zulch at No. 2. All eyes then turned to court three where Brandon Park and Matthew Sah faced a 4-1 deficit. The UCI duo dug deep, coming all the way back to tie it up at 4-all. After Weber State took the next game, Park and Sah reeled off three-straight wins to clinch the doubles point with a 7-5 triumph. The Anteaters kept the momentum in singles where they did not drop a set.
 
SCOUTING THE SPARTANS
Case Western Reserve (8-1), which is fourth in the latest ITA Men's Tennis Division III Team Rankings, won the first NCAA National Team Championship in school history last year. The Spartans are traveling to California from Ohio where they will play eight matches in four days. Senior Vishwa Aduru earned All-America honors last year after winning the NCAA doubles title and advancing to the semifinals of the singles championship.
 
SCOUTING THE LIONS
No. 6 Columbia (9-2) is also in California for the week, taking on UCLA (March 11), Pepperdine (March 13) and UCI (March 15). Sophomore Michael Zheng (8-3), a 2023 All-American, ITA Regional Rookie of the Year and Ivy League Player of the Year, is ranked 15th in the nation in singles. Alex Kotzen (7-2) is also 72nd, while Nicolas Kotzen (9-1) is 113th. In doubles, Theo Winegar and Zheng came in at No. 18 in the ITA Rankings with N. Kotzen and Max Westphal not far behind in 22nd.
 
SINGLES STREAKS
Junior Lawee Sherif (6-1) is on a five-match win streak and has not dropped a set during that stretch. His only loss on the year came to Karl Lee of No. 7 USC on Jan. 19. Graduate student Hiroki Sakagawa (6-2) is also unbeaten in his last seven outings with five victories and two matches that went unfinished. In addition, senior Ali Amiri and junior Noah Zamora have both won four in a row. Last week, Zamora defeated Spencer Johnson of 31st-ranked UCLA in straight sets at No. 3.

FROM THE TOP
Graduate student Enrique Luque Rico transferred to UCI from Pepperdine prior to the 2022-23 campaign and has been a steady force at the top of the singles lineup for the Anteaters since his arrival. This season, he is 6-4 at No. 1 with two of his losses coming against ranked opponents. Last year, Luque Rico went 10-6 in dual matches to earn first-team All-Big West honors. Over his collegiate career, he owns a 44-22 dual-match singles record.
 
WIN NO. 20
In just his 26th decision in his collegiate dual-match career, junior Rithvik Krishna recorded his 20th career win. This year, he has gone 5-3 while playing at Nos. 2-5. Krishna, who is in his third season at UCI, owns an impressive .710 win percentage (22-9). Last year, he earned an All-Big West honorable mention nod.
 
BIG WEST DOMINANCE
Junior Noah Zamora owns a 12-1 career record against Big West opponents. In 2023, he went unbeaten in his last 15 outings where he was 11-0 with four matches that went unfinished. During that stretch, he was 6-0 against Big West foes. Zamora is a two-time all-conference selection in both singles and doubles, and was named the 2022 Big West Freshman of the Year. In his three seasons at UCI, the San Diego native is 32-10 (.762).
 
YEAR FIVE
UC Irvine has a veteran squad led by fifth-year seniors Ali Amiri and Matthew Sah. After seeing their freshman dual-match season canceled in response to the COVID-19 pandemic, Amiri and Sah helped the Anteaters to a Big West tournament title in 2022 and a share of the regular-season championship in 2023. During their UCI careers, the 'Eaters have boasted a 53-28 dual-match record. Amiri is finishing up his undergraduate degree in biological sciences, while Sah is in the Master of Software Engineering program. Sah is the Anteaters' active doubles wins leader at 36.
 
SEASONED NEWCOMERS
UCI bolstered its roster with the addition of three newcomers, including graduate transfers Rahul Dhokia and Hiroki Sakagawa. Dhokia owned a 22-8 overall singles record in two seasons at Texas A&M, and spent his first two years at Baylor where he was a member of the Bears' 2021 Big 12 Champion and NCAA Finalist team. Dhokia made his Anteater debut in doubles on Feb. 25 and in singles on March 5. Sakagawa spent the last four years at the University of Arizona. In 2022 and 2023, the Wildcats won back-to-back Pac-12 regular-season titles. In his first season at UC Irvine, Sakagawa is 6-2 in singles and 6-3 in doubles alongside Andy Nguyen.
 
BLUE CHIP
Freshman Andy Nguyen rounds out UC Irvine's trio of newcomers. Nguyen is a blue-chip recruit from Millikan High School in Long Beach. He was the CIF-Southern Section individual champion in 2022, while he also led the Rams to the CIF Division 4 team title in 2021. Nguyen was ranked eighth in California and 18th in the nation according to Tennis Recruiting. As an Anteater, Nguyen is 11-4 overall and 5-2 in dual matches while playing at No. 3, No. 4 and No. 5 singles.
 
UP NEXT
UC Irvine has a single match next weekend, closing out its homestand against Gonzaga on Saturday, March 23.