Griz head to Boise for a Spring Fling

It's Spring Break in Missoula and the Montana men's tennis team is heading south for a Spring Fling.

On Friday, the Grizzly netters head to Boise for their final outings on the nonconference schedule as one of six teams set to compete at Boise State's Spring Fling mini duals tournament.

The Spring Fling field is made up of two pools of three teams from around the Mountain Region and Midwest, with the results of round robin play in each pool determining day two matchups.

Montana will play two Pool B matches on Friday, March 12, against Idaho and No. 69 Utah State. They will then face off against the first, second, or third place team from Pool A on Saturday, March 13, depending on the results. Pool A is made up of Illinois State, Eastern Washington, and the host Broncos.

Montana enters the tournament at 9-5 on the season and 1-1 in conference play after beating Portland State last week, but falling to the same Idaho Vandals the week prior to set up a rematch in Boise.

The Vandals head to the Spring Fling at 3-8 overall, but themselves are nursing back to health with a 2-1 conference record. Utah State, meanwhile, entered the national rankings this week as one of the winningest teams in the west at 11-2.

Links to live scoring for each match, brackets, rosters and schedules for each team are available at BSU's Tournament Central Page, which can also be found on Montana's schedule page at GoGriz.com.

"It will be an interesting weekend. It will be good to get some matches when the pressure of conference play is off. Hopefully some of the guys who have struggled a bit can find their footing and we can just make the team better before returning to conference play," said head coach Jason Brown.

"That's what the point of this is. There's not a lot of pressure, but we just want to get ready for our next conference match against preseason favorite Sacramento State."

Montana opens the tournament with a very familiar foe in Idaho. It was just two weeks ago the two rivals squared off in Moscow, with the Vandals beating a shorthanded Grizzly squad 6-1 as injuries piled up for UM.

Now back to health, the Griz and Vandals will rematch on a neutral site court at the Eagle Tennis Center starting at noon on Saturday.

"In my 10 plus years here, we've never played a conference opponent this late in the season that isn't for all the marbles in some capacity. We were hoping to avoid Idaho because we just played, but we're happy to get another shot at them. We're going to try to correct what went wrong, heal up the bodies and see how big a homecourt advantage the Kibbie Dome was," added Brown.

Later that day the Griz then complete the doubleheader against one of only two nationally ranked teams they've faced all season in Utah State, who checked in at No. 69 in this week's ITA polls.

Aggie head coach Aaron Paajanen is in his fifth season at USU and has his squad out to the best start in the Mountain West Conference at 11-2. Their lineup has been complete up and down the roster, with five players already racking up eight or more wins in singles and two doubles pairs with six wins or more, including Bodin Zarkovic, who is 12-1 on the year.

"Utah State is super strong, especially up top. They've got some guys playing doubles with ATP points. Those are pro level guys. I think their coach Aaron is doing as good a job if not the best job in our region, so, we're excited to match up with a team that's probably a level better than anyone on our conference," said Brown.

Montana's fate in Boise is likely to be determined by the number of healthy bodies available.

Fernando Perez battled back from a shoulder injury to clinch last week's win over Portland State and was named the Big Sky's co-Player of the Week on Wednesday. It's the second weekly honor from the league for the junior so far this season.

Last Sunday, Perez gutted-out a pair of convincing wins in singles and doubles, and clinched Montana's team victory with a straight set, 6-3, 7-6 (4) win on court three over Viking senior Jan Semerak. He and fellow Spaniard Guillermo Martin also teamed up for a 6-2 win in doubles over PSU's Semerak/Mathiasen pair to help the Griz win the opening point.

One of UM's breakout stars, it's the second time this season Perez has earned weekly honors from the league. The first came on Feb. 7 after the native of Murcia, Spain, went undefeated in two nonconference wins against Eastern Washington and Grand Canyon, clinching the match against GCU as well.

Perez has built a 7-4 record in singles and gone 5-2 in doubles this season while playing through his injury.

Tom Bittner has steadily been another one of Montana's best this season, racking-up a 10-1 singles record with his only loss in three sets against the University of Portland's Nicolas Ocana.

Only one other player in the Big Sky - Wikus Robbertse of Idaho State with 11 – has more wins than Bittner, and he's been a big reason why the bottom of the UM lineup has been so strong at 11-1 on court three.

UP NEXT: Montana enters the heart of the Big Sky season with three-straight home matches over the next two weeks.

The Grizzlies need to finish among the top six teams in the league to advance to the postseason tournament in Phoenix, and will get a jump on that opportunity with four of the next five matches all being played in at the Peak Racquet Club, where UM has been nearly unbeatable.

Montana opens the home stand on March 28 against preseason favorite Sac State before taking on the upstart Idaho State Bengals on March 31.

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Players Mentioned

Tom Bittner

Guillermo Martin

Fernando Perez

University of Montana Athletics