Clemson men’s tennis returned to action this past weekend at the Blue Gray National Tennis Classic in Montgomery, Alabama.
Before the tournament began, it had been over 130 days since the Tigers were last in action. Yet when all was said and done, Clemson’s Henrik Bladelius and Manuel Plunger walked out holding the championship trophy high.
Head coach Brandon Wagner entered four players — in two teams of two — into the partner-style tournament. Bladelius and Plunger were in the gray draw while Edoardo Chérié Lignière and Yannic Nittmann were in the blue draw. Apart from Lignière, all of Clemon’s representatives were freshmen and new additions to the roster as of this summer.
With an overall weekend record of 6-1, with 3-0 singles and 3-1 doubles, Bladelius earned himself the title of tournament MVP.
Bladelius and Plunger dropped their opening doubles match against Rice, but each bounced back with clutch singles victories to propel the duo into a Saturday showdown with North Alabama. The Tigers moved past North Alabama and onto Auburn without dropping a set.
When Plunger fell to Auburn’s Freddy Blaydes in singles, Bladelius came through with a singles win before a joint effort in doubles penciled the Tigers into the final.
After winning the gray draw, Bladelius and Plunger met with blue draw champions, North Alabama, for the second time. A 10-point doubles tie break was the lone decider of the weekend’s victor. Ultimately, the boys in orange and purple defeated Lachlan Brian and Satoru Nakajima 10-7 to start the fall campaign in the best way possible.
While Bladelius and Plunger’s triumph took the headlines, Lignière and Nittmann posted promising scores, too. Nittmann went 3-0 in singles while Lignière, despite a 2-1 singles record for the weekend, was the only Tiger to defeat a ranked singles opponent: Georgia Tech’s No. 53-ranked Christophe Clement. The duo also went 2-1 in doubles play.
In their first fall tournament, the Tigers answered the bell, and then some. With questions in the air, the new-look Tigers responded.
Despite last year’s historic season and triumphant march to the second round of the NCAA tournament, the Tigers found themselves with some offseason holes to fill. Head coach Brandon Wagner bid farewell to seniors Matt Pitts, Max Damm and Maxwell Smith; all key pieces to Wagner’s lineup.
Meanwhile, Wissam Abderrahman and Stewart Aronson took advantage of the transfer portal and ended up at Central Florida and Boise State, respectively.
While these departures carved out sizable gaps in the Tigers’ lineup, a strong core has held the squad together. In the Intercollegiate Tennis Association’s preseason rankings release, the Tigers had two singles players inside the top 60 with Noa Vukadin at No. 25 and Viktor Markov at No. 58. But the story for Vukadin and Markov doesn’t end there; they’re both ranked in doubles, too.
After making waves on the doubles court with Romain Gales last year, Markov returns ranked No. 73 in the country with his partner. As for Vukadin, the Croatian is partnered with newcomer and Blue Gray Tournament MVP Henrik Bladelius, a duo ranked No. 29 nationally.
Last year, Vukadin and Smith played the entire year as Clemson’s No. 1 doubles team. The duo was ranked as high as No. 5 in the country and consistently proved why. Now, Vukadin, as a junior and a bona fide leader, will take over Smith’s role as mentor as he looks to make noise with Swedish freshman Bladelius, ranked No. 15 on the ITA’s newcomer list.
Bladelius is one of four new faces at Duckworth Family Tennis Facility. Additionally, the Tigers added Plunger, Nittmann and Matisse Farzam in their revamp. Farzam is coming off a second-round appearance at the U.S. Open Juniors this year.
Meanwhile, with a year under their belts, sophomores Lignière and Nathan Pitts are ready to turn heads.
Lignière, after cracking the starting lineup and earning some crucial singles wins last season, now has an opportunity to climb the singles ladder. With a top-60 singles win in the Tigers’ first fall competition, Lignière’s abilities, especially as a singles player, will not go unnoticed.
Pitts, who recently went 5-0 and won a UTR College Circuit at Furman, is also headed into the season with a full head of steam.
Off the court, the Tigers bolstered their sideline crew. Former assistant coaches Sander Koning and Austin Rapp were promoted to associate head coaches at the end of the offseason. With two right-hand men, Wagner’s crew looks more united than ever.
This week, the Tigers have their eyes set on Fayetteville, Arkansas — a stop on the M15 ITF Men’s World Tennis Tour.
