UH softball team starts at No. 23

The University of Hawaii softball team enters the new season ranked 23rd in the USA Today/National Fastpitch Coaches Association Top 25 preseason poll.

UH is the lone Big West team to appear in the poll released Tuesday. The Rainbow Wahine finished last season 22nd after completing a 44-9 season with a berth in the NCAA regionals.

UH opens the season with the Oceanic Time Warner Cable Paradise Classic, Feb. 7-9 at Rainbow Wahine Softball Stadium. UH faces Mississippi and UAB on Feb. 7 and Saint Mary’s and No. 16 Washington on Feb. 8, with bracket play set for Feb. 9.

The Wahine are scheduled to face four other teams ranked in the preseason poll during the nonconference schedule. UH plays No. 5 Oregon and No. 19 UCLA in the Louisville Slugger Desert Classic in Las Vegas. The Wahine also host No. 3 California and No. 24 Baylor in the Chevron Spring Fling Tournament, March 13-16.

Defending national champion Alabama tops the preseason poll, followed by Oklahoma.

Michnev advances in singles and doubles

HPU tennis player Petr Michnev, who won a wild card into the $50,000 Maui Challenger, captured his singles and doubles matches in Tuesday’s first round at Wailea Golf Club.

Michnev, from the Czech Republic, overcame American Denis Zivkovic 6-3, 3-6, 6-3 in the singles main draw. Michnev and partner Gerald Moretti, also an HPU sophomore, won the qualifying doubles final, 6-4, 6-3, over Hawaii Pacific coach Hendrik Bode and former Brigham Young-Hawaii All-American Rong Ma.

Ma lost in singles, 6-3, 6-4 to Canadian Peter Polansky.

Third-seeded Michael Russell, a two-time champ in Hawaii, opened with a win over Donald Young, who retired with an illness after losing the first four games. Russell is ranked 87th. Young, No. 38 less than a year ago, is now 190th.

Young played junior tennis with Hawaii’s Dennis Lajola, whose first singles match is today against top-seeded Go Soeda. It starts following the 10 a.m. opener on the Stadium Court between Carsten Ball and Steve Johnson.

Lajola, who helped the University of Hawaii win its first three Western Athletic Conference championships, is ranked No. 632 in the world. He and doubles partner Rick Kepler, Maui Country Club’s director of tennis, defeated Hawaii’s Mikael Maatta and Jan Tribler in Tuesday’s final main-draw doubles match, 6-3, 7-5.

Other first-round winners included Bradley Klahn, who upset eighth-seeded Ryan Sweeting 6-3, 6-4; fifth-seeded Alex Bogomolov, who beat American Michael McClune 6-4, 6-3; and fourth-seeded Tim Smyczek, a 6-2, 6-2 winner over Tsung-Hua Yang.

2 from Hawaii lose in The Ultimate Fighter

Former Hawaii linebacker Jake Heun and Molokai’s Sale Sproat lost elimination fights to qualify for the newest season of the Ultimate Fighter reality show that premiered Tuesday night on FX.

Heun and Sproat were both submitted in the first round. They fought in two of the first three fights shown during the two-hour episode.

Fourteen different fights were held in the 185-pound weight class to see who would make the show. After the fights were completed, teams were picked by captains Chael Sonnen and UFC light heavyweight champion Jon Jones.