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SPARTANBURG, S.C. – The USC Upstate men's tennis team will kick-off the spring 2011 season on Sunday morning when the Spartans, ranked 60th in the Campbell/ITA Pre-season rankings travels down I-85 to face No. 23 Georgia Tech.

Not only is Sunday's match the first of the spring season, it is the first match for Spartan head coach Oliver Trittenwein, who took over the Spartan program in December.  Before arriving in Spartanburg, Trittenwein was the head coach at Texas-San Antonio for 12 seasons before resigning to pursue other opportunities at the end of the 2010 season. 

Trittenwein owns a career record of 133-134 and inherits a squad that lost its three key seniors from last year's squad that went a perfect 10-0 in the A-Sun en route to its first outright conference title in school history.

Since making the move to Division I in 2007, Upstate has faced four teams from the Atlantic Coast Conference, but the Spartans are 0-4 against those teams.  One of the four losses came in the season opener last season at Georgia Tech (L, 1-6, Jan. 17, 2010).  However, the Spartans do have three wins over ranked teams.

Spartan Volleys…

• Upstate claimed the 2010 Atlantic Sun Conference regular season crown after a perfect 10-0 mark in league play last spring... It was the first outright title for the Spartans, who claimed the 2003 and 2005 Peach Belt Conference regular season title as co-champions... Upstate shared the title with UNF in 2003 and Armstrong Atlantic State in 2005.

• Upstate welcomes six new players for 2010-11 and they will have to help fill the shoes of departed seniors Renzo Airaldi, Jack Roux and Javier Tori, who graduated as the most decorated senior class in program history.

• Sunday's match at Georgia Tech marks head coach Oliver Trittenwein's Spartan debut.