Auburn's trio of NCAA men's tennis qualifiers are hard at work preparing for the national championships later this month.
With almost a three-week gap between the announcement of the NCAA championship field and the first day of play, Tyler Stice, Tad Maclean and Finn Murgett are concentrating on intensive daily training sessions to rehearse every eventuality.
Stice is one of 64 singles players selected for the championship bracket. Maclean and Murgett are among the 32 doubles teams in the field.
The singles and doubles competitions will be conducted May 23-28 at the USTA National Campus at Lake Nona in Orlando, Fla., after the conclusion of the team championship, which runs from May 17-22.
"What I've told them is we've got to look at these next two weeks as an opportunity," Auburn head coach Bobby Reynolds says. "Some of the opponents are in the team tournament, while we have these two weeks to just train, to go after it, to work on the weaknesses that we need to refine, keep doing the things where we've been successful and really train.
"You're not able to do that as much when you're going to school and everything else it takes to be a student-athlete. These guys are putting in four-to-five hours per day of training – singles, doubles, fitness, strength -- and as we get closer to the tournament time, we will play more matches so they can become comfortable again in the match-play scenario. We really have every single day to just concentrate at being better at tennis and that's exciting."
Stice, a sophomore from Atlanta, Ga., and a first team all-SEC honoree, is ranked No. 26 nationally. Playing at No. 1 singles, he posted a 16-13 overall record and went 12-9 in the spring, facing 13 ranked opponents.
Listed at No. 26 nationally in the latest Oracle/ITA doubles rankings, the duo of Maclean, a junior from Cornwall, England, and Murgett, a sophomore from Holmfirth, England, went 11-10 this spring at No. 1 doubles, facing 11 ranked teams, and 16-13 for the year.
Maclean is a veteran of NCAA competition, having played in the 2019 doubles championships with then-senior Brandon Laubser.
"I'm looking forward to going back having the experience I had," Maclean says of his 2019 experience, where the Tiger tandem defeated Bertus Kruger and Reese Stalder of TCU in three sets before falling to Baylor's No. 1 ranked squad of Jimmy Bendeck and Sven Lah despite forcing a first-set tiebreaker. "Brandon and I were match points down in the first round and then lost to the No. 1 team in the country in a close first set – we had lots of chances.
"Brandon was a senior, but as a team, we weren't quite as ready as I feel now with Finn. Nothing really fazes me as much as it did back then. With Finn, we started to play our best doubles a bit earlier into the season. We've been slightly wavy with our form, with a few great weekends and few not as good, but this season we have played better doubles throughout."
Murgett also feels Maclean's experience will aid the Tigers' efforts. "Tad bringing that experience is a big help. One of the main reasons I came here was because of him, so it's good that we're a British pair and doing it together. Our weaknesses complement our strengths; the things that he does bad, I do well, and the things that I don't do great, he does pretty well. We're great friends off the court and have a great connection.
"We've struggled a little at times this season in getting going or finishing off, so having two sets, we can work our way into it a little more and work out what we need to win, so I think the longer matches may give us a big advantage."
Maclean agrees the best-of-three-sets format (in doubles, a 10-point match tiebreaker will be played in lieu of a third set) might benefit the Auburn duo. "If we're able to control ourselves as a doubles pair for the long course of the match, we'll be a better pair than a lot of guys. It's like playing a singles match, really, getting another chance after a first set. Normally, when we play the doubles matches out here, we don't get that, so that will be good fun."
Stice, Auburn's singles contender, is looking forward to challenge as well.
"I'm more excited than anything. This is probably the biggest tournament I've ever played, so it's definitely exciting, and nerve-wracking as well," Stice says. "So I'm going to do everything I can to get ready for it. And the enhanced prep time is going to be tremendous, especially with how hard we're working now. We're going to try and do literally everything possible to get ready for this tournament."
The Auburn contingent will leave for Orlando late next week, and the singles and doubles draws will be announced Saturday, May 22.
