Kirijax
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When we think of college sports dynasties, everyone has a team that immediately springs to mind. If you ask the average fan, UCLA basketball’s 88-game winning streak, Oklahoma football’s 47-game winning streak or Southern California baseball’s five consecutive College World Series championships may stand out. Recently, we have seen Penn State volleyball win 109 consecutive games. Among Miami Hurricanes fans, football team’s home game winning streak of 58 games, or the baseball team’s run of 41 consecutive years in the postseason is a source of Canes Fam Pride.
If you google the Internet for information on all-time winning streaks and sports dynasties, the above mentioned teams always make the lists. Some may surprise you. Arkansas’s indoor track team won twelve consecutive national championships. Kentucky basketball won 129 consecutive home games. North Carolina soccer won nine consecutive national championships. But surprisingly, more often than not, there is a team that is mentioned when winning streaks are brought up in the news articles.
Miami Hurricanes Men’s Tennis Team
The records show that the Miami Hurricanes men’s tennis team won 137 consecutive dual matches in a row. A dual match is team tennis, where teams will play a number of singles and doubles matches, with the winner of the most matches winning the dual match. So you must have a solid team of players to achieve this feat. What’s even more astonishing is that this streak came right before a 72-match winning streak. So over the course of a decade, the Canes men’s tennis team was an astonishing 209-1 in dual matches.
This amazing record started with the third match of the 1957 season and ended in the third to last match of the 1964 season. The Canes were defeated by Princeton to finally end the winning streak.
One of the odd things about this streak is that the Miami Hurricanes have never won the national championship of college tennis. So if they don’t have a title, then how could they have had a winning streak? The present format of the NCAA Tennis Championships began in 1977. Since this year, the NCAA used the dual match format used during the regular season to determine the champion. Prior to this, the NCAA used a point system. The NCAA held singles and doubles tournaments and points were awarded to players determining how far they got in the tournament. At the end of the tournament, the team with the most players and most points won the championship. Miami came close in 1965 and again in 1975 by finishing second, but they were unable to score better than the teams from the west. Since the start of the NCAA team championships in 1946, the teams from the west have dominated the college tennis scene. Southern California has won 20 national titles, while Stanford has won 17 championships and UCLA follows with 16 titles. That means of the 69 championships held, these three teams have taken 53 of the titles. The closest team after this “Tennis Trinity” is Georgia, which has won six championships. In the Canes runner-up years, they finished second to UCLA both times.
Former Georgia Bulldogs coach Dan Magill, who coached for 34 years, won two national championships and is enshrined in the Intercollegiate Tennis Hall of Fame has called the 137-match streak left by the Miami Hurricanes “virtually unbreakable”. Since 1977 when the present format started in the NCAA Championships, only a handful of teams have managed to finish a season without a loss, much less multiple seasons.
Would the Hurricanes have beaten the west coast teams if the present format had been used? It’s safe to say that the Canes would have given the Bruins and Trojans a good fight but the streak would probably not have happened if they had been able to play each other every year. But it is also safe to say that it is clear that the Canes were best of the East, and during that time in history, they left a record that may never be broken.
The current Miami Hurricanes have fallen on hard times a bit, but the Canes’ tennis program has a rich history; 39 NCAA tournament appearances, four NCAA singles champions, two NCAA doubles champion teams, and twenty-nine All-Americans. The Hurricanes team will rise again and someday take that elusive national championship. Canes fans can be proud of the football teams and baseball teams, but they can also be proud of their tennis team, which did something no other team in the nation has ever done and probably will never do.
NCAA Division I Dynasties
Which College Sports Winning Streak Wins
Wikipedia Winning Streaks
137: A Look Back on Miami's Amazing Streak
Canes Tennis
If you google the Internet for information on all-time winning streaks and sports dynasties, the above mentioned teams always make the lists. Some may surprise you. Arkansas’s indoor track team won twelve consecutive national championships. Kentucky basketball won 129 consecutive home games. North Carolina soccer won nine consecutive national championships. But surprisingly, more often than not, there is a team that is mentioned when winning streaks are brought up in the news articles.
Miami Hurricanes Men’s Tennis Team
The records show that the Miami Hurricanes men’s tennis team won 137 consecutive dual matches in a row. A dual match is team tennis, where teams will play a number of singles and doubles matches, with the winner of the most matches winning the dual match. So you must have a solid team of players to achieve this feat. What’s even more astonishing is that this streak came right before a 72-match winning streak. So over the course of a decade, the Canes men’s tennis team was an astonishing 209-1 in dual matches.
This amazing record started with the third match of the 1957 season and ended in the third to last match of the 1964 season. The Canes were defeated by Princeton to finally end the winning streak.
One of the odd things about this streak is that the Miami Hurricanes have never won the national championship of college tennis. So if they don’t have a title, then how could they have had a winning streak? The present format of the NCAA Tennis Championships began in 1977. Since this year, the NCAA used the dual match format used during the regular season to determine the champion. Prior to this, the NCAA used a point system. The NCAA held singles and doubles tournaments and points were awarded to players determining how far they got in the tournament. At the end of the tournament, the team with the most players and most points won the championship. Miami came close in 1965 and again in 1975 by finishing second, but they were unable to score better than the teams from the west. Since the start of the NCAA team championships in 1946, the teams from the west have dominated the college tennis scene. Southern California has won 20 national titles, while Stanford has won 17 championships and UCLA follows with 16 titles. That means of the 69 championships held, these three teams have taken 53 of the titles. The closest team after this “Tennis Trinity” is Georgia, which has won six championships. In the Canes runner-up years, they finished second to UCLA both times.
Former Georgia Bulldogs coach Dan Magill, who coached for 34 years, won two national championships and is enshrined in the Intercollegiate Tennis Hall of Fame has called the 137-match streak left by the Miami Hurricanes “virtually unbreakable”. Since 1977 when the present format started in the NCAA Championships, only a handful of teams have managed to finish a season without a loss, much less multiple seasons.
Would the Hurricanes have beaten the west coast teams if the present format had been used? It’s safe to say that the Canes would have given the Bruins and Trojans a good fight but the streak would probably not have happened if they had been able to play each other every year. But it is also safe to say that it is clear that the Canes were best of the East, and during that time in history, they left a record that may never be broken.
The current Miami Hurricanes have fallen on hard times a bit, but the Canes’ tennis program has a rich history; 39 NCAA tournament appearances, four NCAA singles champions, two NCAA doubles champion teams, and twenty-nine All-Americans. The Hurricanes team will rise again and someday take that elusive national championship. Canes fans can be proud of the football teams and baseball teams, but they can also be proud of their tennis team, which did something no other team in the nation has ever done and probably will never do.
NCAA Division I Dynasties
Which College Sports Winning Streak Wins
Wikipedia Winning Streaks
137: A Look Back on Miami's Amazing Streak
Canes Tennis
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