The postseason future of the No. 41 Penn State men's tennis team hangs in a cloud of uncertainty.

On Friday, in its first match in the Big Ten tournament, the No. 5 seed Nittany Lions fell to No. 4 Wisconsin, 4-0, in West Lafayette, Ind.

After the loss to the Badgers there is doubt about whether or not Penn State will play in the NCAA men's tennis tournament, which begins May 11.

The Lions will find out at 2:30 tomorrow afternoon when the teams for the tournament are announced on ESPNEWS. Penn State head coach Todd Doebler said that he feels that the team does have a good shot at making the NCAA tournament. The case for the Lions is rather strong. They finished 16-6 overall and had a team-record six wins in the Big Ten. Penn State also had four wins against ranked teams, including a 4-3 win over No. 20 Michigan in Ann Arbor.

"If it were my last match, we ended with the best record in Penn State tennis, ever," senior Bradley Hunter said.

But in what could have been the Lions' last match of the season, the score didn't reflect the match according to Doebler.

Wisconsin jumped ahead and got the doubles point after winning two of three doubles matches. The duo of senior Ryan Berger and junior Michael James beat the Badgers' Lachezar Kasarov and Moritz Baumann, 8-6.

Then in singles play, Wisconsin won three in a row to win the match. The final three singles matches were aborted after Wisconsin won its fourth team point.

"It was one of those matches were it was one point here or there," Hunter said.

Two of the three singles matches went into the third set. No. 81 James took the first set against Wisconsin's No. 112-ranked Baumann. The Wisconsin player then won the next two sets, 6-1, 6-0.

Berger also went into the third set, this time against Nolan Polley, who won the match 6-2, 2-6, 6-3.

The indoor match was only played on three courts, as Doebler noted that Wisconsin plays better inside than outside, though he did not want to make excuses for the sweep.

"We had opportunities in all the matches," Doebler said, "and we didn't take advantage of them.

The Badgers went on to lose to No. 1 seed Ohio State, 4-0, on Saturday. The Buckeyes defeated No. 3 Illinois, 4-1, yesterday to win the Big Ten championship.

Now the wait begins for Penn State.

Notes

James was named to the 2007 All Big Ten team, and Berger was honored with the 2007 Sportsmanship Award.