FLAGSTAFF, Ariz. (April 27, 2023) — The Lumberjacks are heading down the mountain to Phoenix as the Big Sky Tournament gets underway from April 27-29 at the Phoenix Tennis Center this weekend. NAU is set to play the No. 5 Idaho State Bengals after the Bengals picked up a victory to the No. 4 Weber State Wildcats on Thursday morning.
After a 7-0 undefeated conference record in the regular season, the Jacks claimed the Big Sky's regular season championship, putting them at the No. 1 seed in the weekend tournament. As the No. 1 seed, NAU will have a first-round bye and automatically advance to the semifinals on Friday. The Jacks will face the lowest seed remaining after the quarterfinals on Thursday.
The Jacks have been ranked for eight straight weeks, coming in at No. 71 in this week's latest rankings.Leading the Jacks through singles play are senior Alex Groves and junior Dominik Buzonics who each hold a 16-2 record while each on an 11 match win streak themselves. Sophomore Piotr Galus closely follows the two with a 19-3 record while primarily playing at No. 2.
Through doubles play, the pairing of Groves and Gals continue to see success together, primarily playing at the No. 2 spot with an overall record of 17-3. The duo have clinched the last two doubles points for the Jacks against Weber State and GCU.
NAU last took on the Bengals on April 8 in Pocatello where the Lumberjacks clinched a 4-3 victory. After the Jacks earned the Tumosa recovered from a loss in the first set to pull off the reverse sweep against Sklenka and was victorious in the match-deciding tiebreaker in the third set to win, 2-6, 6-1, 7-6.
Buzonics had an easy time on Court 4 against junior Wikus Robbertse, both fresh from not competing in doubles play. Buzonics improves to 13-2 and a perfect 4-0 in conference with his straight-set win, 6-2, 6-3.
Groves continued the trend of near-identical finishes by improving to 5-0 in conference play by defeating Fujita on Court 5 with ease by looking even stronger as the match went on as he won, 6-3, 6-0. Groves has now beaten Fujita head-to-head each of the last two seasons, having won 6-2, 6-1 in Flagstaff also on Court 5 almost 12 months ago.
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