Maravic Earns Fourth Big Ten Athlete of the Week Award
4/27/2005 12:00:00 AM | Men's Tennis
PARK RIDGE, Ill. -- Freshman Matko Maravic (Zagreb, Croatia/V. Gimnazija) of the University of Michigan men's tennis team was selected as the Big Ten Conference's Athlete of the Week for the fourth time this season, the league office announced Wednesday morning (April 27). Since its inception in 1999, no other individual has received the men's tennis Athlete of the Week award more than three times in a single season.
| | Maravic |
Maravic, the first U-M freshman in recent history to compete at the top singles position, earned perhaps his biggest Big Ten victory against the Hoosiers by knocking off then No. 57-ranked Jakub Praibis, 6-3, 6-4, to clinch the overall team win for Michigan. Maravic kept on rolling the next day, ousting then No. 80-ranked Mark Barry to give U-M its third team point against the Nittany Lions. With the two victories, Maravic improves to 6-3 against nationally-ranked opponents in 2004-05.
Maravic, who is ranked 79th in this week's ITA national singles rankings, enters the postseason tied for the team lead in overall singles victories (20-12), including a team-best 15-8 record in dual match action at Nos. 1-4. He holds a 10-5 record against Midwest Regional opposition in 2004-05 and a 6-4 mark in Big Ten play.
Maravic and sophomore Brian Hung (Hong Kong, China/Sagemont Virtual School) went undefeated in their two doubles matches over the weekend. After clinching the doubles point against Indiana on Friday with a 9-8(5) victory over Praibis and Dmytro Ishtuganov, the U-M tandem defeated Barry and Malcolm Scatliffe 8-3 for the Wolverines' first doubles win against Penn State on Sunday. Maravic and Hung, who have been victorious in 10 of their last 12 matches, have compiled a team-high 12-5 record at No. 1 doubles in 2005, including an impressive 8-2 showing in the conference.
This marks the fourth career Big Ten weekly award for Maravic. He previously earned three straight nominations in February through March (Feb. 25, March 17 and March 24). The conference did not issue an accolade for the week of March 3-10.
Maravic will lead 58th-ranked Michigan (14-9, 7-3 Big Ten) into battle at the 2005 Big Ten Championship, held this Thursday through Sunday (April 28-May 1) at the University of Illinois in Champaign, Ill. The third-seeded Wolverines drew a first-round bye and will face the winner of No. 6 seed Penn State and No. 11 seed Purdue in the quarterfinals on Friday (April 29) at the Illini Grove Courts (2 p.m. CDT).
Contact: Marc Ressler (734) 763-4423
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