Luis Humberto Lopez enters his third year on the UC Irvine men's tennis staff and first as an associate head coach in 2024-25.
In his two seasons as an assistant coach at UCI, the Anteaters won a Big West Championship and a co-regular season title. They are 30-15 (10-2 Big West) with nine All-Big West singles selections and four all-conference doubles teams since 2023.
Last year, the second-seeded ‘Eaters defeated Cal Poly in the semifinals before taking down No. 1 seed and 45th-ranked UC Santa Barbara in the championship match to claim the program’s fifth Big West tournament title. They went on to make their 12th NCAA Tournament appearance. UC Irvine closed out the campaign with a 17-7 record (5-1 Big West) and was 69th in the final ITA Rankings.
Individually, Andy Nguyen was named the Big West Freshman of the Year. Enrique Luque Rico, who was 123rd in the final national singles rankings, and Hiroki Sakagawa were first-team all-conference selections. Rithvik Krishna and Noah Zamora earned second-team recognition, and Nguyen was an honorable mention pick. Three Anteater doubles teams also received All-Big West distinction - Rahul Dhokia/Zamora (first team), Nguyen/Sakagawa (second team) and Brandon Park/Matthew Sah (honorable mention).
In his first year on staff, Humberto Lopez helped guide UCI to a share of its first Big West regular-season title since 2015. The ‘Eaters went 5-1 in conference to finish in a three-way tie for first with UC Santa Barbara and UC Davis. As the No. 2 seed at the Big West Championships, UC Irvine defeated the third-seeded Aggies to advance to the title match for the second year in a row. Four Anteaters earned All-Big West honors.
Humberto Lopez is a UC Irvine alum, playing three seasons for the Anteaters and graduating with a bachelor's degree in political science and a minor in management in 2019. He was a six-time All-Big West selection, receiving the distinction in both singles and doubles each year. Lopez concluded his UCI dual-match career with a 36-23 singles and 36-19 doubles record.
Humberto Lopez transferred to UC Irvine after spending his freshman campaign at Utah State where he helped the Aggies to their first-ever Mountain West Conference regular-season title. He registered 21 overall singles wins with 15 coming in dual-match play.
Following graduation, Humberto Lopez played professionally, earning career high ATP rankings of 1261 in singles and 1611 in doubles. His best win on tour was a three-set victory against the 300th-ranked player in the world. He also had a straight-set doubles win against a top-100 opponent.
Humberto Lopez earned his master's degree in Logistics and Supply Chain Management from the University of Nottingham. While attending graduate school, Lopez also competed on the tennis team, playing No. 3 singles and No. 1 doubles in the top division in the United Kingdom.
Humberto Lopez has continued to play in local tournaments, most recently winning the 2024 USTA National Open Hard Court Singles Championship in San Diego.
