PROVIDENCE, R.I. – The American Athletic Conference has announced its first men’s tennis honor for the month of September.
AMERICAN ATHLETIC CONFERENCE MEN’S TENNIS PLAYER OF THE MONTH
Tim Ruetzel • Jr. • Tulane • Munich, Germany
Ruetzel is off to a 5-1 start in both singles and doubles play as he earned a pair of flight championships at the Alabama Invitational in mid-September. Ruetzel defeated opponents from Miami (Fla.), Alabama, Rice and Princeton, taking three straight-set victories, to claim the top singles flight, while he added a 3-0 mark in doubles play with parter Akos Kotorman to win the doubles flight.
AROUND THE AMERICAN
Wichita State junior Fatima Bizhukova leads a group of five American Athletic Conference women’s players who appear in the 2018-19 preseason Oracle/ITA Division I women's tennis rankings.
Bizhukova, a unanimous all-conference selection who qualified for the NCAA Championship in singles play, is ranked No. 24 nationally to enter the 2018 fall season. ECU senior Celia Ruiz checks in at No. 50, while Tulsa's Martina Okalova is No. 54 to start the season. UCF sophomore Rebeka Stolmar, who was The American's Freshman of the Year in 2018, is No. 87 in the preseason ranking, while Wichita State's Sandra Honigova is No. 94.
The preseason doubles rankings have Wichita State's tandem of Fatima Bizhukova/Marta Bellucco at No. 14 nationally. ECU's duo of Celia Ruiz/Lisa Hofbauer is No. 42.
Six men’s players from The American are ranked in singles play to start the 2018-19 season.
USF senior Alberto Barroso-Campos is the highest-ranked of The American's singles players at No. 35. Barroso-Campos earned all-conference honors in both singles and doubles for the Bulls, who finished as the runner-up in the American Athletic Conference Championship. Tulsa's Majed Kilani is ranked No. 39 in the preseason ranking, while the Golden Hurricane's Joshua Goodger is ranked No. 55. Both players were all-conference selections in singles last season.
Tulane, which won the 2018 American Athletic Conference title, had three players in the preseason rankings. Junior Ewan Moore is No. 60, senior Tyler Schick is No. 103 and sophomore Hamish Stewart is No. 121.
The preseason doubles rankings list Tulane's tandem of Ewan Moore/Akos Kotorman at No. 36 nationally, while Tulsa's duo of Joshua Goodger/Jarod Hing is No. 56.
A number of American Athletic Conference players will be in action in early October at the ITA All-American Championships. The men’s singles draw includes Tulsa’s Majed Kilani and Kody Pearson among the 64 players competing on the Tulsa campus, while the doubles bracket has Tulsa’s tandem of Jarod Hing/Daniel Siddall and SMU’s duo of Jan-Simon Vribsky/Tomas Vaise in the field. The women’s championships, played in Malibu, California, will feature Wichita State’s doubles tandem of Fatima Bizhukova/Marta Bellucco.
The 2019 American Athletic Conference Men’s and Women’s Tennis Championships will be held in April at the USTA National Campus in Orlando, Florida. The women’s championship takes place April 17-20, while the men’s championship will be played April 18-21.