When the Southeastern Conference Tournament began, the Florida
men's tennis team had almost no momentum.
The Gators had lost five of their last eight matches. They were
slated as the fifth seed in the tournament, and they had fallen to
three of the four teams ranked ahead of them.
Although Florida was considered to be out of the running in a
tournament which was Tennessee's to lose, the Gators clawed out
wins and emerged victorious, winning the 2011 SEC Championship on
Sunday at Linder Stadium.
"This is the same way we've played all season in terms of effort,"
coach Andy Jackson said. "It's not that we're doing something
drastically different or that we were doing something wrong before.
We pushed and kept coming close all year, and we finally broke
through in the biggest moments of our season."
The Gators chomped number three-seed Kentucky 4-0 to win their
fourth match in four days-and fourth tournament championship in
program history.
"The thing with the seeding is that it matters most what the team
thinks," Jackson said. "We felt as though we could win regardless
of what people were saying."
Jackson, who has said many times this season his team is capable of
playing with the best programs in the country, finally saw the
Gators play to their full potential this weekend.
In its run to the title, Florida beat top-seeded Tennessee in the
semifinals, a team they had lost to 7-0 in the regular season, and
Kentucky, revenging a 4-3 home loss to the Wildcats on April
1.
"I think the difference in the Tennessee match is that we were
playing at home this time," Jackson said. "And in [Sunday's] match,
well we have just improved quite a bit. We were able to do better
in a close match and that's what improvement does for you."
Florida got started by capturing the doubles point. UF then won two
singles matches in straight sets courtesy of Sekou Bangoura Jr. on
Court 2 and Bob van Overbeek on Court 4.
For the second time this tournament, Nassim Slilam provided the
match-clinching win, a 4-6, 6-4, 6-3 comeback against Brad Cox on
Court 3.
"To be able to win the last match is amazing," Slilam said. "I was
talking to [assistant coach] Antoine [Benneteau] and I told him,
'You have to help me. I'm stressed. You're going to have to tell me
what I have to do on each point.'"
Slilam had several clutch moments throughout the weekend, but it
was senior star Alexandre Lacroix who was named tournament MVP
Sunday.
"He's our leader in every area," Jackson said. "To be able to win
the SEC tournament championship on our home court means a lot, and
we couldn't do it without his leadership."
