By
Lindsey Manroel
Arizona Daily Wildcat
4 Wildcats represented in past weekend tournament
The UA football team was not the only squad to dominate an event this past weekend.
At the San Diego All-College Men's Tennis Tournament, the Wildcat tennis team managed to overcome San Diego's homecourt advantage and advance to two championship matches.
The tournament's host team, the University of San Diego, entertained Cal Poly San Luis Obispo, Loyola Marymont, San Diego State, UC-San Diego, Point Loma Nazarene, UC -Riverside, UC -Irvine, UC -Santa Barbara in the 10-team tournament. Perhaps nobody in the entire tournament dominated quite like Wildcat junior Bruno Arapovic.
In the quarterfinals round of the "Flight 2" singles bracket, Arapovic defeated SDSU's Khalid Naffa, 6-3, 6-2 to earn a berth in the semifinals.
While the semifinals presented Arapovic with slightly more difficulty, he managed to defeat UCSB's Alex Yaftali, 7-5, 6-3 to advance to the championship match.
"I definitely wasn't expecting to win," Arapovic said. "I felt really confident, but my only goal was to go there and play my best tennis. I guess it paid off."
Despite suffering from a lower back injury during the quarterfinals - an injury that UA trainers felt was serious enough to recommend that the junior withdraw from the match altogether - Arapovic would not back down.
Playing in a tournament that hosted three teams from San Diego -SDSU, UCSD and rival USD - Arapovic would not let the home-crowd advantage hold him back from capturing a championship.
"It was a tough match because I was playing against (SDSU) and the whole crowd too," Arapovic said.
Despite facing long odds during Sunday's championship match , Arapovic managed to defeat Aztec Sean Hiatt, 6-4, 6-2, capturing his first collegiate championship and the first for a Wildcat this off-season.
"I was very happy for him," UA assistant coach Bob Helmig said. "He's worked extremely hard to work his way into the lineup and all of his hard work is paying off."
The second Wildcat to succeed in the tournament was junior Steven Capriati, who defeated USD's Stephen Taylor 6-2, 6-1 in the quarterfinal match of the "Flight 1" bracket.
Following the victory against Taylor, Capriati continued his winning ways, beating Rodrigo Suarez of PLMU in the semifinals.
"He's very aggressive at the baseline with a big serve," Helmig said. "He just came across a very smart player in the finals."
In the final round of the tournament, Capriati was defeated by SDSU's Oliver Maiberger, 6-3, 6-2.
In the doubles bracket, the first-time doubles team of freshman Whi Kim and Capriati put up a tough fight against the Aztecs, but fell short of the championship match as they were defeated by SDSU, 9-7.
Although no doubles teams represented Arizona in the championship match, Helmig was satisfied with the performance of his players.
"They performed really well together," Helmig said. "And they know now that they can compete against the nation's best doubles teams and win."
Senior Jari Niskala was defeated in the second round of the 'Flight singles bracket, but the San Diego native was excited to play in his hometown.
"When you're at USD, it's their crowd," Arapovic said. "But (with Niskala's family in the crowd) you felt at home because they're firing you up. It really helps."
Arapovic and the Wildcats will try to rally their way to the nation's top-40 rankings when their regular season begins this spring.
