The No. 68 Wisconsin men's tennis team travels to Indiana this weekend to take on the Indiana Hoosiers (0-4 Big Ten, 6-10 overall) in Bloomington on Saturday and the No. 52 Purdue Boilermakers (2-2, 7-8) in West Lafayette on Sunday. The Badgers (1-3, 7-6) are looking to bounce back from losses to Pepperdine and Santa Clara over spring break. The team feels that achieving two wins this weekend is their most important goal.
\We're hoping to get two wins. ... That's obviously the goal,"" Head Coach Pat Klingelhoets said. ""It's really a very crucial weekend for us. We're 1-3 in the Big Ten, we've got two teams here that we certainly can beat. ... We really need to go in and get a couple wins and just turn things around again, if we want any kind of decent seed going into the Big Ten Tournament.""
""We want to get two wins,"" senior Danny Westerman said. ""We're back into the Big Ten. They're two teams we feel we should beat. We beat Purdue last year and lost to Indiana. We should come out with two wins, that's what we're looking for.""
The Badgers will rely highly on their veteran talent this weekend. Westerman and senior Scott Rutherford have been solid all year in the top two singles and doubles spots for the Badgers. Westerman is now ranked No. 28 in the nation, according to the latest poll, which was released Wednesday. The doubles team of Westerman and senior Justin Baker have also been playing strong lately. The duo has a 7-1 record since being added as a doubles team for the Badgers.
""We clicked right from the start,"" Westerman said. ""We played together freshman year. We know each other's strengths and weaknesses. ... We complement each other pretty well.""
Baker was also just recently added to the singles lineup. He has played in four singles matches so far and has a 2-2 record.
""Justin's one of those guys that's got lots of talent, he's been playing excellent doubles for us,"" Klingelhoets said. ""He can play a little bit better in singles, and I think he will. He just needs a few more matches under his belt here and I think he'll start putting it together a little bit.""
The team feels that they don't need to adjust the lineup for this weekend. However, Klingelhoets did a little fine tuning on the players to strengthen their games a bit to get ready for this weekend and the approaching Big Ten Tournament.
""We're pretty much gonna stay with the lineup. I feel good about our doubles lineup ... singles, same thing,"" Klingelhoets said. ""We've got individual players that have been struggling with certain parts of their game and we're making an effort this week to work on them. ... As far as the lineup, we're pretty much set there.\
