Coming off three weekends of back-to-back meets, Illinois men’s tennis will defend its home court against a similar No. 7 Kentucky team and try to redeem its 1-3 home record.

Tied for a No. 19 Division-I ranking with Stanford, the Illini have hit some unexpected bumps in their season with a loss to Tulsa and two to Tennessee — all at home.

“I think that just coming off that Duke win, we didn’t really want to have that let up against Tennessee,” sophomore Ross Guignon said of last weekend. “For the most part, they just out-toughed us, and we can’t let that happen again.”

Like Kentucky, Illinois graduated its No’s. 1 and 2 players — Dennis Nevolo and Roy Kalmanovich, respectively — which resulted in younger rosters for both teams. Head coach Brad Dancer has talked about the “great energy” his younger athletes bring to their tennis game, but the rankings lean in the Wildcats’ favor.

“I think we’re hungry. All of us are hungry,” senior Bruno Abdelnour said. “Of course, they’re better ranked than us, so it’s a very good opportunity for us to take.”

With Toledo as the exception, the Illini have relinquished five of six doubles points this season, making it their undeniable weak spot. But Guignon said falling just a couple points short in the last weekend’s match against Tennessee shows progress.

“Things are starting to click, but we just need six guys firing on all cylinder in the same match,” Guignon said. “I think we’re pretty close now.”

Another weekend with home-court advantage has Guignon and Abdelnour optimistic, but it will take much more than loud fans to pull out a victory.

“I really think with our win over Duke, I just think we’ve got a lot of guys doing a lot of the right things,” Guignon said. “As long as each person is taking care of what we need to take care of, I think we should be able to walk away with a win.”

J.J. can be reached at [email protected].