It was UK, and it came down to the last match.

Here’s the rundown of outcomes that led to UK advancing:

• UK’s No. 1 doubles team of Eric Quigley and Brad Cox — a combination ranked No. 19 nationally — rolled 8-3 for the first segment.
• UofL’s Austen Childs/Adam Donaldson pairing won 8-4 shortly after, meaning the doubles point — which is awarded to the team that captures 2 out of the 3 doubles matches — came down to the third court.
• UK’s Alex Musialek/Anthony Rossi team won 8-6 to clinch the double point, giving UK a one-point headstart on the race to 4 points.
• After this match concluded, singles play began on six courts, with each court representing one possible point.
• UK got its second point at the No. 4 position, as UK’s Alberto Gonzalez beat Robert Hall in straight sets, 6-2, 6-4.
• Louisville’s Simon Childs won at the No. 3 courts, 7-6 (4), 6-3, over UK’s Brad Cox. Overall, UK was up 2-1.
• At the No. 5 court, UK’s Anthony Rossi won 7-5, 6-2, meaning UK only needed one more victory on any of the other three courts to advance.
• Louisville’s Andrew Carter, playing at the No. 6 spot, kept Louisville alive with a straight-set 7-5, 6-4 victory.
• At Center Court, Louisville pulled a comeback upset, as No. 16 Austin Childs rallied back from dropping the first set in a tiebreak to beat No. 6 Eric Quigley6-7 (2), 6-2, 6-4.
• That tied the score overall at 3-3, with the No. 2 court the location of the decisive action. By the time Quigley had lost, this match was into the third set — a set UK’s No. 53 Alex Musialek was rolling through — but it still had to be finished off. Musialek did, defeating No. 93 Viktor Maksimcuk 5-7, 7-5, 6-0. Musialiek talked to 247Sports.com about the experience of having all eyes on him.

The win gave UK back-to-back Round of 16 trips for the first time since 1991-92. UK will play in Stanford, Cali., on Thursday against either Miami or Florida.

Last season, UK lost in the Round of 16 to eventual champion Southern California.

1. Character Award
Caitlyn Ciokajlo (Gymnastics)

2. Community Service Award
Ashleigh Gustafson (Softball)
Josh Nadzam (Track and Field/Cross Country)

3. Supporting Role
Megan Moir (Women’s Golf)

4. Female Scholar Athlete of the Year
Kayla Sergesketter (Women’s Swimming and Diving)

5. Male Scholar Athlete of the Year
T.J. Daugherty (Baseball)

6. Female Academic Team of the Year
Cross Country

7. Male Academic Team of the Year
Cross Country

8. Female Rookie of the Year
Caitlin Landis (Soccer)

9. Male Rookie of the Year
Brandon Knight (Men’s Basketball)

10. Female Performance of the Year
Chanda Bell (Softball)

11. Male Performance of the Year
Ethan Settlemires (Rifle)

12. Scratch Award (awarded to the non-scholarship athlete of the year)
Walter Luttrell (Track and Field/Cross Country)

13. One Shining Moment
Men’s Basketball

14. Bill Keightley “Assist” Award (awarded to the trainer or team manager of the year)
Sarah Gerichs (Women’s Basketball team manager)

15. Blue Heart Award (awarded to the best recovery from a serious injury)
Amber Smith (Women’s Basketball)

16. Coach of the Year
John Calipari (Men’s Basketball)
Rachel Lawson (Softball)
Harry Mullins (Rifle)

17. K-Association Female Athlete of the Year
Victoria Dunlap (Women’s Basketball)

18. K-Association Male Athlete of the Year
Randall Cobb (Football)

19. Miss Wildcat
Lauren Rapp (Volleyball)
Megan Yocke (Softball)

20. Mr. Wildcat
Eric Quigley (Men’s Tennis)

21. Teams of the Year
Men’s Basketball
Rifle

With a top-10 ranking, home-court advantage and a first round bye, the last thing the UK men’s tennis team expected to see was the two-time defending conference champions in the Southeastern Conference tournament. But that’s exactly who they saw on the other side of the net when the Mississippi Rebels took the courts of the Hillary J. Boone Tennis Center. After a long, competitive match, the Cats fell to the Rebels 4-0. Along with the loss fell the hopes of a conference title.

“I thought the first time we played Ole Miss we were much more aggressive, both on the court and emotionally,” UK head coach Dennis Emery said. “This time we let Ole Miss come to us. We didn’t handle being the favorites well and that caught the coaches off guard.”

Ole Miss began by sweeping both doubles matches, including taking down the nation’s No. 25 doubles pair in Brad Cox and Eric Quigley. Quigley’s luck didn’t improve as the match transitioned to singles play. UK’s top player, and the No. 13 player in the nation, lost for the first time in the month of April to Marcel Thiemann 6-4, 6-2.

“I can’t speak for one of my guys, but I’m sure (Eric Quigley) was disappointed,” Emery said. “One thing I love about Eric is he has so much character, and he has the ability to bounce back from losses well. So I know he will bounce back.”

The 19th-ranked Rebels stayed on the attack in the other matches as well.

UK junior Brad Cox fell in No. 3 singles 6-1, 6-4. In a tiebreaker, UK’s lone senior, Alex Lambropoulos, fell 6-2, 7-6 (7-2) in No. 6 singles to seal the Cats’ fate.

“I don’t know where the loss ranks in my career, but it certainly ranks outside of the top ten,” 28th-year head coach Emery said. “I knew it would be a close match. You always want to win in front of your home fans, but I knew it was going to be a tough match for us.”

Next for UK is the NCAA tournament, which begins on May 14. The Cats’ will learn their tournament fate on May 4 when the entire field is announced.

While UK believes it will make the field, its tournament opponent and seeding are yet to be determined.  The goal is to reach the NCAA team championships, beginning May 21, and to send players from UK to the individual championships, beginning May 26.

Emery plans on using the Ole Miss loss as a teaching tool for his team, as well as a motivational tool to prepare his team for its biggest matches of the season.

“I think the loss was a good wake up call,” Emery said. “We hadn’t taken a loss in a while, having won 12 out of our last 13 matches going into the conference tournament. For us to win regionals and reach the final 16, we will eventually face a team similar to Ole Miss, and we can’t let that team attack us like Ole Miss did. It’s as good a learning tool as any, and it’s better to have learned it now than to learn it at the NCAAs.”

Last fall, Alabama and Florida led the way for the Southeastern Conference, holding the top two spots in the coaches’ poll almost the entire season. But the SEC’s depth doesn’t stop there. Louisiana State and UK are all ranked in the top 10, and they’ll all face off this weekend in Lexington for the conference tournament.

“There is some great competition,” UK head coach Dennis Emery said. “The SEC is the top conference in the country every year. The great thing is with the non-conference schedule we played, we saw eight top-10 teams this season, so we know what it looks like.”

UK, despite being ranked No. 8 in the nation with a 23-7 record earned the fourth seed in the SEC Tournament. On Friday, the Cats will face the winner of the Ole Miss-South Carolina opening round matchup.

If UK advances past the quarterfinals, it will likely face the top-seeded Tennessee Volunteers, who finished the regular season 23-1, including a perfect 11-0 record in conference play. But UK is focusing on its first opponent.

“We will have no problems with preparing for Ole Miss,” Emery said. “We beat them earlier this season for the first time since 2002. Ole Miss is one of the elite programs in the country and the players realize it. Unless we act like complete idiots, we should have no problems focusing on them.”

The second-seeded Florida Gators (17-3, 9-1 SEC) and the third-seeded Georgia Bulldogs (17-6, 9-2 SEC) also pose big tests for the Cats. This season, UK was a perfect 8-0 in conference against teams behind it in the conference standings. But against the top three teams in the conference, Tennessee, Florida and Georgia, the Cats could not manage a single win.

“We were five-all, love-30 against Florida and had four match points against Georgia,” Emery said. “So we were two points away from being 10-1 in the conference. We are trying to continue to get better. The way we beat those teams this time is to be a little better at the end of matches.”

But the SEC Tournament gives the Cats a chance at redemption, and a chance to gain some revenge after those close matches earlier in the year.

“Our guys really like each other, and really like playing together,” Emery said. “The camaraderie our guys have means a lot at the end of the year.”

By Ethan Levine

It was just the type of match you would expect to see between two Southeastern Conference rivals. Two highly ranked teams, three top-50 players, five end-of-set tiebreakers, and a season’s worth of emotion all packed into UK’s 7-0 victory over Vanderbilt at the Hillary J. Boone Tennis Center Saturday.

“We played very well against Vanderbilt, especially at the end of sets,” said UK head coach Dennis Emery, now in his 28th year. “Vanderbilt is a very good team and very tough to beat, the win was a real testament to our mental toughness.”

The match was the season finale for UK, now ranked No. 8 in the nation, as well as Vanderbilt, ranked No. 31. The excitement started at the top in the No. 1 singles match between the Cats’ Eric Quigley and Vanderbilt’s Ryan Lipman. Both players are the top players on their respective squads, as well as top-50 nationally with Quigley coming into the match at No. 11 and Lipman ranking No. 30.

After winning the first set 6-3, Quigley went into a second set tiebreaker with Lipman, which ended with Quigley prevailing 7-3, and claiming the set overall 7-6. The Cats’ top player remains undefeated in the month of April as he continues to lead the team’s charge into the postseason.

UK’s other top-50 player, Alex Musialek, needed a first set tiebreaker of his own to win his No. 2 singles match 7-6 (7-5), 6-2. UK also went on to win their other four singles matches, requiring two more tiebreakers and a marathon 17-game third set in the No. 6 singles match, which was eventually won by UK’s Alex Lambropoulos 7-5, 6-7 (4-7), 10-7.

In doubles, UK won two of three matches, the third of which went unfinished. Winners included the No. 23 doubles pair in the nation, Quigley and Brad Cox, as well as UK’s unique all-French doubles tandem of Alex Musialek and Anthony Rossi.

The Cats now adjust their focus from the regular season, which finished with a seven-match win streak, to the SEC Tournament, which will be played in Lexington starting Thursday and running through Sunday. The conference currently contains four, top-10 teams, including UK.

Emery enters the tournament understanding what he and his team are up against.

“We have had a good year, and we have played well at home,” Emery said. “Outside of the NCAA tournament, the SEC tournament is one of the best tournaments in the country. Everybody comes in thinking they have a chance, so it is going to be very tough. We have a lot of momentum having won 12 of our last 13 matches, so hopefully we can continue to play with that same focus and sense of purpose.”

From Paris, Ky., to Paris, France, the game of tennis translates into any language. Nowhere is this more relevant than on UK’s men’s tennis team.

The French connection begins at the top with fifth-year associate head coach Cedric Kauffmann. Kauffmann came to the U.S. at age 14 to play tennis at the Bollettieri Tennis Academy in Florida, a prestigious training ground that has trained the likes of Maria Sharapova, Andre Agassi, and Venus and Serena Williams. After four years at the academy, Kauffmann played tennis for UK from 1994-98.

“I love the city of Lexington,” Kauffmann said. “I love the people I work for; it is a good place to have a good team.”

Now, UK has two more Frenchmen in sophomore Alex Musialek and freshman Anthony Rossi. Both players credit much of their decision to come to UK to Kauffmann.

“We look at players from everywhere — first in America and then outside,” Kauffmann said. “I looked where I have connections, and of course, one of those places is France. I know big coaches in France, the players e-mailed me back and now they are here.”

When asked what his favorite part about coaching Musialek and Rossi was, Kauffmann said he knows French and American players are coached differently.

“I have spent as much time in France as I have in America, so I recognize what the players need and what they like and dislike,” Kauffmann said.
Musialek, who hails from Dax, France, said when he first got to UK, he couldn’t speak any English.

“I came here and couldn’t speak English,” Musialek said. “But Cedric really helped me learn English and build my confidence. I didn’t know anything about UK before I got here, but Cedric really helped me.”

Musialek said there are many differences between the French and American cultures that took some getting used to.

“In general, people here are friendlier,” Musialek said. “You can walk down the street and people will say hello to you, even if you don’t know them. That doesn’t happen in France. I was also surprised at the fact that people here really care about their sports. The French like their sports, but people here are really passionate.”

Rossi, a freshman from Martigues, is still adjusting to the culture and improving his English, and said it helps to have Kauffmann, as well as Musialek, around to help him settle.

“Speaking English is tough,” Rossi said. “I am living in a new system for me.”

When asked if they missed anything from home, including friends and family, both quickly said the food at home was much better.

One thing that helps comfort Musialek and Rossi is when they play doubles together. As doubles partners, the two have experienced a lot of success together.

“We can speak French on the court and no one can understand us,” Rossi said. “I played doubles once with Eric Quigley, but I like playing with Alex better. We are always together.”

Musialek and Rossi agreed they have more opportunities in the U.S. and at UK than they did in France.

“It helps to have someone from your native country to speak to if you get homesick. But I never get homesick here,” Musialek said. “I like fighting for UK.”

“For sure when I came here, it was because of the French people here at UK,” Rossi said. “When I talk to my friends in France, I try and get them to come here. Life is much better here.”

The UK men’s tennis team made quick work of non-conference foe Lipscomb on Tuesday at home in the Hillary J. Boone Tennis Complex. The Cats defeated the Bisons 5-1 by winning two of three doubles matches and five of six singles matches. Lipscomb has now lost seven straight matches.

Among the Cats players to win their matches yesterday was sophomore Eric Quigley, the top-ranked player on UK’s squad and a top-20 player nationally. Quigley and teammate Anthony Rossi won their No. 1 doubles match 8-4 to start the day. Quigley also won his No. 1 singles match 6-1, 6-2 later that afternoon against Lipscomb’s top player, Daniel Haugstefer.

“I was playing pretty well coming into today’s match,” Quigley said. “I played well last weekend against Arkansas and LSU. This kid today was pretty good, but I just stayed focused and got the win.”

Alex Lambropoulos, the lone senior on UK’s roster and the No. 2 ranked player on the team, also posted a victory yesterday over Lipscomb’s Chad Pierron in straight sets, 6-2, 6-1.

Juniors Alberto Gonzalez and Brad Cox and sophomore Matt Davis also posted singles victories, overcoming the sweltering heat that consumed Lexington. Davis and sophomore Chris Leeper also won their No. 3 doubles match en route to the Cats’ victory.

The win against Lipscomb was a big way for UK to end its non-conference schedule. This Saturday the Cats take on Southeastern Conference rival Vanderbilt as they attempt to close out their strongest regular season in recent years. UK is 22-7 and 7-3 in conference play. It is the first time the team has won 20 games in a season since 2004, and the 11th time in UK head coach Dennis Emery’s 28-year tenure. Of their 21 wins, 5 have come against top-16 teams, including a win last weekend against No. 13 Illinois.

Quigley, a native of Pewee Valley, Ky., is a big reason for the Cats’ success this season.

“I am pretty pleased overall with the way I have been playing,” Quigley said. “It’s a long season, there are always ups and downs, but I just keep getting better every day for the postseason.”

When asked how he felt about the team as a whole going into the SEC tournament next week, Quigley felt confident about UK’s chances.

“Everyone knows their roles,” Quigley said. “We have a great coaching staff, no one is slacking off; we are working hard. I feel like I just fill another spot on the team. We have pulled out some close matches this season as a team, and I really like our chances going into the postseason.”