STANFORD, Calif. — The No. 25 Pepperdine Waves begin their fifth-consecutive NCAA Tournament run in Stanford, Calif., where they'll square off against the No. 35 Alabama Crimson Tide on Friday.
First serve at the Taube Pavilion at the Arrillaga Tennis Center is scheduled for 10 a.m. PT. The match will be livestreamed via PlaySight and through Cracked Racquets' cross-court cast. All pertinent links will be available on the men's tennis team's schedule page on pepperdinewaves.com.
This will be Pepperdine's fifth NCAA Tournament appearance under Director of Tennis Adam Schaechterle, who has led the Waves to winning postseason matches in three of the last four seasons. Should the Waves get past the Crimson Tide on Friday, they will face either the host team and 4-seed Stanford Cardinal or Mountain West Conference tournament champion New Mexico on Saturday at noon.
MATCH 27: #25 Pepperdine (16-10, 5-2 WCC) vs. #34 Alabama (15-12, 4-10 SEC) | Friday, May 2 | 10 a.m. PT | Taube Pavilion at Arrillaga Tennis Center | Stanford, Calif.
SCOUTING THE WAVES
After earning an at-large bid to the NCAA Tournament, the Pepperdine Waves are ready for the postseason.
Director of Tennis Adam Schaechterle's squad is one of the youngest, most talented squads in college tennis. Led by No. 21 Edward Winter and the nation's second-ranked recruiting class, Pepperdine has talent across the roster, plays solid doubles and boasts two NCAA individual qualifiers on the roster for the first time since 2013. The Waves are one of five teams outside the Power-4 ranks with multiple top-100 singles players and a nationally ranked doubles team.
Not only that, Pepperdine's resume backs up its ranking. The Waves were tested in the regular season, as Schaechterle is wont to do, and they improved on last year's 14-12 record with a challenging schedule. They won seven matches against NCAA Tournament teams — including wins over top-16 seeds Columbia and Texas A&M — and nine of their 10 losses were to NCAA Tournament teams. Yet over one month has passed since Pepperdine's last signature win. Perhaps this week could bring another.
To make the program's first second-weekend appearance under Schaechterle, the Waves will need everyone to step up this weekend to counter Alabama's star power atop the lineup and solid doubles, then Stanford's all-around excellence.
Thankfully, Pepperdine is far from a one-man show. Throughout the season, different Waves have been ready for the moment — whether it was Aleksa Pisaric clinching Pepperdine's win over Texas A&M, Linus Carlsson Halldin helping the Waves take down Columbia, or Edward Winter going 7-0 in March, coinciding with the Waves' first top-20 ranking in two years.
Winter leads Pepperdine with 14 dual-match victories and five ranked wins, including a straight-set upset win over defending NCAA Singles Champion Michael Zheng in straight sets. After going through the gauntlet playing atop the Pepperdine lineup as a freshman last year, the two-time All-WCC First Team selection is having the best season of his collegiate career. In doubles, he teams up with his younger brother, Hugh Winter, as Pepperdine's only nationally ranked team. The Winter brothers checked in at 80th in the latest ITA rankings, and the brothers have three nationally ranked wins this season.
After missing Maxi Homberg in the lineup for almost a month, Pepperdine's latest All-American is ready for his third postseason appearance in the Waves' lineup. Homberg is 86th in the latest ITA rankings and has six wins in dual match play, two of which were against ranked opponents. Fellow veteran Linus Carlsson Halldin will also make his third NCAA Tournament appearance. The senior captain has had a knack for clinching big matches for the Waves, including the aforementioned Columbia upset, a 4-3 win over Arizona State, a WCC semifinal win over Santa Clara and Pepperdine's first win at UCLA since 2006.
Aside from Winter, Pepperdine has three freshmen with at least 10 dual-match wins. German Lasse Poertner moved up to second in the Waves' lineup in Homberg's absence, and the freshman's big serve and great returning give the Waves a rising star at the third position. Poertner and David Fix, Pepperdine's sixth singles player, are on five-match win streaks, and both Germans will be critical if the Waves want to make it out of the second weekend. This leaves Aleksa Pisaric, the speedy, athletic Serbian who has a 10-9 record at the fifth position and isn't afraid of pulling off dramatic, three-set comebacks.
Pepperdine will need to ride its positive momentum in doubles play this weekend. Although they have one nationally ranked pairing, the Waves won the doubles point 18 times in the regular season with three balanced teams. No pairing has won more than Pisaric and Poertner, who are 15-5 while beating up teams at the third position. But the doubles point could come down to the veteran team of Carlsson Halldin and Homberg, who carry a five-match win streak at the second position.
The Waves are searching for their first second-weekend appearance since 2013, when former head coach Adam Steinberg led the team to the quarterfinals. Playing in Palo Alto this weekend has extra historical significance for Pepperdine: The Waves won the NCAA national title at Stanford's old facility, the Taube Tennis Center. All told, Pepperdine has a 6-2 record in postseason matches at Stanford.
ACROSS THE NET
Making its sixth NCAA Tournament appearance under head coach George Husak, the No. 34 Alabama Crimson Tide earned an at-large bid after finishing 12th in the Southeastern Conference standings. Led by spring 2024 NCAA Singles Champion No. 22 Filip Planinsek, the Crimson Tide endured several lean years, yet the team was rewarded with the program's first back-to-back NCAA Tournament appearances since 2021.
Despite the 15-12 record, Alabama has a 5-7 record in 4-3 matches this year. Although the Crimson Tide beat then-No. 15 Florida State, Georgia, Kentucky, Auburn and Vanderbilt in 4-3 results, they've also been on the wrong end of 4-3 matches against the likes of Arkansas and Ole Miss, whose seasons are over. The Crimson Tide is no stranger to high-pressure matches, which could be beneficial come tournament time.
A four-time All-SEC Team honoree, Planinsek made a shocking run to the 2024 spring NCAA singles final, where he dispatched Micah Braswell, Cooper Williams and Michigan State's Ozan Baris before outlasting Columbia's Michael Zheng in three sets to win the national title. Planinsek elected to play on the pro circuit this past fall, yet he returned for his final college tennis season this past spring and went 16-3 in dual match play. He didn't miss a beat, going 12-0 to start the season. Friday's match between Planinsek and Edward Winter will be can't-miss tennis.
However, Alabama isn't a one-man team. No. 77 Roan Jones, who was an NCAA Singles Tournament participant last fall, gives the Crimson Tide two nationally ranked players in the lineup. Jones has gone 6-6 against nationally ranked players and is 10-10 in dual-match play. Yet Alabama's Matic Kriznik, who plays at the fourth and fifth positions, leads the team with a six-match win streak heading into the NCAA Tournament. Kriznik will be invaluable for the Crimson Tide, whose lineup hovers around a .500 record at the second through sixth singles positions.
Alabama boasts two nationally ranked doubles pairings: No. 14 Damien Nezar and Andrii Zimonkh, plus No. 36 Matic Kriznik and Filip Planinsek. Nezar and Zimonkh have a team-best 15-6 record and are 5-3 against nationally ranked players, while Kriznik and Planinsek — a fairly new team — are just 4-5 on the year. Despite two nationally ranked pairings, the Crimson Tide won the doubles point just four times in their last 10 matches.
Pepperdine has a 5-4 advantage over Alabama in the all-time series, yet the Waves haven't beaten the Crimson Tide since 2011. The Waves are 4-0 against Alabama on a neutral court. This will be the program's first meeting in the NCAA Tournament.
WHAT'S NEXT
Should the Waves win on Friday, they will face either the host team and 4-seed Stanford or New Mexico on Saturday at noon. All schedule updates can be found on the men's tennis team's schedule page on pepperdinewaves.com.
