NEW ORLEANS — Xavier University of Louisiana men's tennis extended Tuesday its school record for consecutive appearances at NAIA nationals when the Gold Rush received one of 11 at-large bids to next month's tournament.
        The Gold Rush (13-9) are seeded ninth and will play 24th-seeded Ottawa (Kan.) (18-7) in the first round at 1 p.m. CDT May 13 at Copeland-Cox Mobile Tennis Center (851 Gaillard Drive, zip code 36608, phone 251-208-5181). Admission is free for every round.
        This is XULA's school-record 16th consecutive appearance at nationals and 16th overall. The streak does not include 2020, when the tournament was canceled in mid-March because of the COVID-19 pandemic. The Gold Rush are a three-time NAIA national runner-up, finishing second to Georgia Gwinnett in 2016, 2017 and 2019. Men's tennis is the only XULA program to reach the championship round of a bracketed NAIA national tournament.
        The XULA-Ottawa winner will play eighth-seeded William Carey (15-3) in the second round — the round of 16 — at 1 p.m. May 14. Twenty-four teams qualified.
        In order from the top, XULA's singles lineup will be Jacobi Bain, Nereo Suarez, Ivan Vazquez, VanDer Woody, Artur Yakubov and Gabriel Velez. The doubles teams will be Bain and Suarez at No. 1, Vazquez and Velez at No. 2 and Woody and Yakubov at No. 3. Also on the roster for nationals is Pedro Maggi.

Nereo Suarez photo by Yamlak Tsega