TEMPE, Ariz. (August 21) – Mississippi State University’s Nuno Borges, who capped a stellar four-year career by being named the 2019 Intercollegiate Tennis Association (ITA) National Male Player of the Year, will be honored this week in New York as part of the ITA Leadership Weekend.
Borges will be recognized along with University of Georgia standout and ITA National Female Player of the Year Katarina Jokic, 10 ITA Arthur Ashe Jr. Leadership and Sportsmanship Award winners and Duquesne University’s Andrew “Drew” Akins, who was selected as the recipient of the 2019 ITA Ann Lebedeff Leadership Award Endowed by Billie Jean King.
Borges, is a five-time ITA All-American (three singles, two doubles) who ended his impressive four-year Bulldog career in May. A native of Maia, Porto, Portugal, Borges was named to the ITA Collegiate All-Star Team and an ITA Scholar-Athlete. He is a three-time SEC Player of the Year and capped his senior campaign by advancing to the NCAA Championships singles final and concluding the season as the nation’s No. 1 singles player.
Borges reached the NCAA Singles title match on May 25 in Orlando, after having become the first Bulldog ever to advance to the NCAA semis, accomplishing the feat in 2017, 2018 and 2019. He finished his final season with a sparkling 37-3 singles mark that included a program-best 31-match winning streak, with 26 of those 31 wins coming in straight-set fashion. He became the first Bulldog in program history to finish a season ranked No. 1 nationally in both singles and doubles.
During his four-year career at Mississippi State, Borges amassed a staggering 121 singles triumphs while adding 68 doubles victories to total 189 overall wins as a Bulldog, which ranks first all-time in the MSU men’s tennis record book. He also ranks first in two other wins categories, including total dual match wins (135) and dual match singles victories (81). More impressively, he is Mississippi State’s all-time leader in overall winning percentage (74.4%, 189-65), singles winning percentage (84.0%, 121-23), overall dual match winning percentage (75.8%, 135-43) and singles dual match winning percentage (87.1%, 81-12).
In the classroom, the two-time SEC Scholar-Athlete of the Year holds a sparkling 3.90 cumulative GPA after pacing the Bulldogs with a 4.0 this spring. Borges is slated to complete his bachelor’s degree in kinesiology with a concentration in clinical exercise physiology in the fall. He is a three-time ITA Scholar-Athlete and earned First-Team Google Cloud CoSIDA Academic All-America honors in June.
The ITA Leadership Weekend serves as a prelude to the start of the 2019 US Open main draw that begins Monday, August 26, at the Arthur Ashe Tennis Stadium.
Highlights of the weekend include participation in the Arthur Ashe Kids Day at the USTA Billie Jean King National Tennis Center and an awards banquet inside the Empire State Building on Saturday before concluding with a community service event at the Cary Leeds Center for Tennis in the Bronx on Sunday.
The ITA will return to New York on September 7 when it presents internationally renowned business executive Doug Conant with the 2019 ITA David A Benjamin Achievement Award.
About the Intercollegiate Tennis Association
The Intercollegiate Tennis Association (ITA) is committed to serving college tennis and returning the leaders of tomorrow. As the governing body of college tennis, the ITA oversees men’s and women’s varsity tennis at NCAA Divisions I, II and III, NAIA and Junior/Community College divisions. The ITA administers a comprehensive awards and rankings program for men’s and women’s varsity players, coaches and teams in all divisions, providing recognition for their accomplishments on and off the court. For more information on the ITA, visit the ITA website at www.itatennis.com, like the ITA on Facebook or follow @ITA_Tennis on Twitter and Instagram.
