March 29, 2012
Live scoring of North Carolina match
Live scoring of Duke match | Live video of Duke match
ATLANTA – Coming off a pair of important home court wins last weekend against Boston College and Miami, the Yellow Jackets go on the road this weekend for the first time since Feb. 25, visiting two of the top teams in the Atlantic Coast Conference for matches against 20th-ranked North Carolina and No. 6 Duke.
The Yellow Jackets visit the Tar Heels at 3 p.m. Friday, have a day off, then face the Blue Devils at 1 p.m. Sunday.
Head coach Kenny Thorne’s team (8-7, 3-2 ACC) ran its winning streak to three matches last weekend with a 7-0 victory over Boston College and a 4-3 comeback victory over Maryland at home.
North Carolina (7-5, 4-1 ACC) and Duke (14-3, 3-1 ACC) have lost only to third-ranked Virginia in ACC play this spring. The Tar Heels are 2-4 against teams in the top 25, while the Blue Devils are 6-3 against top-25 teams.
Thorne has a solid 1-2 combination at the top of Tech’s singles lineup in All-American Kevin King, the nation’s 11th-ranked player in singles, and Juan Spir. King, a senior from Peachtree City, Ga., has played very well this spring at the top singles position in the Tech lineup, building a 13-2 record with his only losses coming to the nation’s 2nd and 10th-ranked players. Spir, a junior from Medellin, Colombia, has a 9-6 mark this spring.
Dusan Miljevic, a senior from Novi Sad, Serbia, has won three straight matches since moving into the No. 3 spot, including the deciding point in the Yellow Jackets’ 4-3 win over Maryland last Sunday. Juan Melian, a junior from Las Palmas, Spain, now playing No. 4, is 9-5 this spring.
Freshmen Eduardo Segura (Madrid, Spain) and Sebastian Lopez (Medellin, Colombia) have been solid at the bottom of the order for Tech, Segura going 7-7 at No. 5 and Lopez 7-2 at No. 6.
King and Spir, the nation’s No. 7-ranked doubles team, has lost just twice this spring, to Wisconsin and Maryland, are 12-2, including a win over Georgia’s top team. Thorne shuffled his No. 2 and 3 teams for the Clemson match back on March 4, pairing Miljevic and Segura at No. 2 and Lopez and Vikram Hundal at No. 3. Both teams are 3-1 since the re-pairing.
