No. 20 UCLA (0-0) at
UC Irvine (0-0)
Date: Friday, Jan. 17
Time: 1 p.m. (PST)
Location: Anteater Tennis Stadium - Irvine, Calif.

UC Irvine (0-0) at
Pepperdine (0-0)
Date: Saturday, Jan. 18
Time: 1 p.m. (PST)
Location: Ralphs-Straus Tennis Center - Malibu, Calif.

UC Irvine (0-0) at
USC (0-0)
Date: Monday, Jan. 20
Time: 11 a.m. (PST)
Location: David X. Marks Tennis Stadium - Los Angeles, Calif.

Match Notes

IRVINE, Calif. - UC Irvine men's tennis is set to kick off the 2025 campaign against No. 20 UCLA on Friday, Jan. 17. Originally scheduled to be played at Los Angeles Tennis Center, the season opener for both teams has been moved to Anteater Tennis Stadium with first serve at 1 p.m. 

UCI is also slated to travel to Pepperdine on Saturday, Jan. 18, and USC on Monday, Jan. 20.

ANTEATER TIDBITS
• Senior Noah Zamora is 31st in the ITA Singles Rankings.
• In the fall, Zamora became the first Anteater to compete in the NCAA Singles Championship since 2011.
• He advanced to the Round of 32 after upsetting No. 13 Sebastian Dominko of Notre Dame in the opening round.
• Zamora punched his NCAA ticket with a runner-up finish at the ITA Southwest Regional Championships where he went 5-1.
• UCI returns five letterwinners and four all-conference performers from last year's Big West Championship squad.
• Andy Nguyen was the 2024 Big West Freshman of the Year.
• Nguyen, Zamora and Hiroki Sakagawa also garnered all-conference distinction in both singles and doubles.
• In addition, Rithvik Krishna made the All-Big West Second Team in singles.
• Mike Saunders earned his second career Big West Coach of the Year award.

SCOUTING THE BRUINS
No. 20 UCLA (0-0) has four players featured in the ITA Singles Rankings. Spencer Johnson, who defeated Noah Zamora in the ITA Southwest Regional championship match, leads the way at No. 13. The sophomore closed out the fall season with a 10-2 singles record, including five wins against ranked foes. Johnson was the 2024 Pac-12 Freshman/Newcomer of the Year and received first-team all-conference acclaim. In doubles, the Bruin pairing of Aadarsh Tripathi and Alexander Hoogmartens are ranked 10th. They advanced to the quarterfinals of the NCAA Doubles Championship back in November.

SCOUTING THE WAVES
Pepperdine (0-0) won the West Coast Conference regular-season title and received an at-large NCAA Tournament bid in 2024. The Waves are led by No. 36 Maxi Homberg, who made it to the Round of 16 at the 2024-25 NCAA Singles Championship. Edward Winter, the 2024 WCC Freshman of the Year, is also back along with all-conference selection Linus Carlsson Halldin.

SCOUTING THE TROJANS
USC (0-0) saw its streak of 16-consecutive NCAA appearances snapped last year after going 7-16 overall. The Trojans return four letterwinners from their 2023-24 squad. USC has one doubles pair featured in the ITA Rankings with newcomers Tristan Bradley and Niels Hoffmann coming in at No. 109.

AMONG THE BEST IN THE NATION
Senior Noah Zamora enters the 2025 campaign ranked 31st in the nation in singles. Zamora had an impressive fall season in which he became the first Anteater to compete in the NCAA Singles Championship since 2011, and the first to advance in the tournament since 1989 as he upset No. 13 Sebastian Dominko of Notre Dame in the Round of 64. Zamora qualified for his first NCAA singles tournament by advancing to the final at the ITA Southwest Regional Championships where he won five-straight matches, including a victory over No. 109 Casper Christensen of Arizona in the quarterfinals. Zamora added another ranked win at the ITA All-American Championships where he defeated No. 64 Miguel Perez Pena of Georgia, 7-5, 6-3. 

Sophomore Andy Nguyen also had a pair of ranked victories during the fall, taking down No. 52 Iiro Vasa of San Diego, 6-2, 6-4, and No. 125 Nicholas Godsick of Stanford, 6-2, 7-6 (5).

LEAVING A LEGACY
Fourth-year seniors Noah Zamora, Rithvik Krishna and Lawee Sherif will be looking to cement their legacy in 2025. The trio has helped the Anteaters to a pair of Big West Championships (2022, 2024) and a co-Big West regular-season title (2023) in their time at UCI. Since their arrival in 2021-22, the 'Eaters have boasted a 47-22 dual match record. Individually, all three have at least 25 overall singles wins. Zamora leads the way at 58-25 (39-12 dual), while Krishna is 42-22 (26-11 dual). Sherif, who had a career-high 17 victories last season, rounds out the group with 25 wins (17 dual).

BIG WEST DOMINANCE
Noah Zamora has been even better in Big West play with an 18-1 career record. He is unbeaten in his last 23 outings against conference foes (including postseason) where he is 17-0 with six matches that went unfinished. The only Big West loss of his career came against Cal Poly on April 3, 2022. Zamora is a three-time all-conference selection in both singles and doubles, and he was named the 2022 Big West Freshman of the Year. 

NGUYEN WINS
Andy Nguyen returns after an impressive 2023-24 campaign in which he was named the Big West Freshman of the Year, earned second-team all-conference honors in doubles and was an honorable mention pick in singles. Nguyen went 18-6 overall and 12-4 in dual match singles in his first collegiate season. He was a blue-chip recruit out of Millikan High School where he was the 2022 CIF Southern Section individual champion.

OUR HIRO
Graduate student Hiroki Sakagawa is back for his second season with the Anteaters after transferring from Arizona. Sakagawa was a key member of the 2024 Big West Championship squad as he clinched UCI's wins in both the semifinals and finals. He garnered first-team all-conference honors in singles and second-team recognition in doubles.

ENTERING THE MIX
UC Irvine brings in four newcomers with two transfers and a pair of true freshmen. Mason Bui is a four-star recruit out of Yorba Linda High School. He was a two-time Crestview League singles champion and four-time all-league performer. Ruining Huang is a freshman from Hangzhou, Zhejuang, China. Huang was a U14 national singles champion and won the 2020 Senior High School singles championship. Sohrob Amiryavari is a graduate transfer from UNLV, while Max Fardanesh comes to UCI with three years of eligibility after competing one season at UC Davis. Fardanesh also attended UCLA for one year but was not a member of the tennis program. He was a five-star recruit and ranked as high as No. 8 nationally for the 2021 class on TennisRecruiting.net.

UP NEXT
UC Irvine will stay on the road next weekend with a 12 p.m. match at San Diego State on Sunday, Jan. 26.