Gardner-Webb Men's Tennis to Honor Seniors Saturday Morning
April 09, 2010 | Men's Tennis
BOILING SPRINGS, NC - The Gardner-Webb men's tennis team will honor its two seniors Saturday morning during the team's last home match of the season against Abraham Baldwin Agricultural College. Evgeny Slesarev and Rafael Altmayer will be honored in a pre-match ceremony at the Webb Tennis Complex, with the match beginning at 9:30 AM.
Both Slesarev and Altmayer enrolled at Gardner-Webb in January 2007 and were counted on immediately by the team. Neither had the fall semester to prepare for their freshman season and both spoke another language when arriving. Both adapted to their new surroundings and flourished in both the college game and in school, becoming two of the most successful players in the program's history.
Evgeny Slesarev, who came to Gardner-Webb from Krasnoyarsk, Russia, currently has 66 singles wins and 42 doubles wins, which are both team records at the Division-I level. Thus far, he has been named First-Team All-Conference three times in singles, with his first two years as part of the Atlantic Sun Conference and last year with the Big South Conference, has been named Conference Player of the Week numerous times, been part of three ITA All-Academic teams, and has received academic honors from both the Atlantic Sun and Big South Conferences.
Gardner-Webb Head Coach Mike Griffith had this to say about Slesarev: "He is the best player that I have ever coached. However, what makes Evgeny unique is how humble he is. He has had so many accomplishments in tennis, but what I always here from others is what a nice person he is and how he plays with awesome sportsmanship."
Rafael Altmayer, from Porto Alegre, Brazil, currently has 34 singles wins and 22 doubles wins during his time at Gardner-Webb. The two-time captain of the team has earned Academic All-Conference honors from both the Atlantic Sun and Big South Conferences, and was named First-Team All-Conference for doubles play in 2009 by the Big South with Slesarev.
Coach Griffith had this to say about Altmayer: "He is the most improved player that I've had in my eight seasons at Gardner-Webb. He started out playing No. 6 singles and won many deciding points for the team his freshman year. He is a big time player who went from playing No. 6 singles and now has moved up to No. 3 singles and No. 1 doubles. Of all of the players that I have ever coached, Rafa has as much heart as anyone."
Saturday's match against Abraham Baldwin Agricultural College will be the last home match of the 2010 season, with the team wrapping up the schedule with three road matches next week at Erskine, UNC-Asheville, and Liberty before preparing for the Big South Tournament, which will take place from April 22nd-24th in Radford, Va.
