Men's Tennis Heads to Baton Rouge for Jerry Simmons Invitational

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NEW ORLEANS, La. - The New Orleans Privateers men's tennis team will take part in their second tournament of the month when they travel to Baton Rouge for the Jerry Simmons Invitational. The Privateers are seeded sixth in the eight-team field and will face Georgia State in the opening round Saturday at 9:30 a.m.
 
New Orleans competed in a strong field at the Florida State Spring Invitational two weeks ago and went 1-2. The Privateers lost to Florida State and Louisiana. Their triumph was a 6-0 score against Florida A&M.
 
"We're playing one of the toughest schedules we've played in a few years," said Coach Burzis Kanga. "We started the season early to give these guys an opportunity to play. This weekend is going to be a tough tournament for us but at the same time the players are looking forward to it."
 
The Privateers were defeated by 4-0 decisions against Florida State and Louisiana, but the remaining matches that went unfinished in both defeats were hanging in the balance. New Orleans will face another tough field this weekend when they open with Sun Belt runner-up Georgia State. The Privateers will have a second match on Saturday against either LSU or defending Southland champion, Lamar.
 
Mats Westkamp, Misha Fomenkov, Odysseas Papaioannou, and Nicolas Kramer all picked up singles victories in Tallahassee. Samuel Armand also was credited with a win by default since Florida A&M only had four players available for singles.
 
"Georgia State is going to be a tough match but what I do like is we're starting with singles first," said Kanga. "I think we're a stronger team in singles and if we can somehow pull through against Georgia State we'll be in a good spot."
 
The field for the invitational is as follows in seed order from one to eight: South Florida, LSU, Georgia State, Penn State, Louisiana, New Orleans, Lamar, and Nicholls.
 
The Privateers will follow their tournament foray with a busy start to February. New Orleans will have four matches in the first three days of the month against Alcorn State, Jackson State, and UTSA.
 
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