MISSOULA — The Big Sky champion Montana men’s tennis team will travel to face the No. 3 seed and SEC champion Texas Longhorns in the first round of the 2025 NCAA tournament on Saturday in Austin, Texas.
The matchup was announced Monday afternoon during the NCAA selection show broadcast.
The Griz (19-6) will face the 2024 national runner-up Longhorns (25-4) in the round of 64 at the Texas Tennis Center on the UT campus starting at 12 p.m. Mountain time.
The dual marks the first time Montana has ever faced Texas on the tennis court. The winner of the match advances on to face the winner of the Michigan-vs.-Cornell dual in the round of 32.
“The reward of getting to go is just incredible for these guys, and it's going to be such an amazing experience,” said Montana coach Jason Brown.
“Texas is coming off an incredible season. They were the national runners-up last year, and they have the highest UTR in college tennis this year. We’re getting the cream of the crop, and I think that’s honestly going to make for an even better memory for these guys to get to battle and share a court with one of the toughest teams in the country.
“We’re going to go give it our all and have a great time representing the University of Montana, the state, and the Big Sky Conference.”
Montana received the Big Sky’s automatic bid to the NCAA tournament for the first time since 2014 last Saturday after the No. 3-seeded Griz upset No. 1 seed Northern Arizona 4-1 at the league’s championship tournament in Phoenix.
Big Sky freshman of the year Duncan McCall scored points for Montana in all three of the Grizzlies’ matches in Arizona, clinching the win for UM in both the quarterfinal and semifinal rounds. UM junior Tom Bittner clinched the championship match for the Griz by beating conference MVP Danni Torres of NAU in a three-set thriller.
Texas earned the No. 3 seed in the NCAA tourney after defeating No. 13 South Carolina 4-1 in the SEC championship tournament.
The Longhorns are led by sixth-year head coach Bruce Berque who holds a 148-34 overall record at UT Austin. Along with winning the 2019 national championship, the Longhorns were the national runners-up in 2024 and 2008, and additionally made it to the semifinals in 1993, 2006, 2009, 2021 and 2023.
On the court the Longhorns are led by the nation’s No. 1 ranked singles player in redshirt-freshman Timo Legout, who enters the match with a34-3 overall record this season and is 21-2 during the spring duals season. Before his time at Texas he was rated the No. 12 player in the ITF world junior rankings and ranked as high as No. 406 in the ATP world singles rankings.
