LOS ANGELES, Jan. 30, 2024 – Tennis Channel will have complete, live coverage of the United States’ Davis Cup qualifier against Ukraine this week in Vilnius, Lithuania, Feb. 1-2. The head-to-head matchup, with the winner advancing to the Davis Cup Finals in November, is one of many contests slated for the network and its streaming service Tennis Channel Plus Feb. 1-4. The Americans will get underway Thursday, Feb. 1, at 11 a.m. ET, and are led by the country’s top-ranked singles player, Taylor Fritz, and World No. 1 doubles-star Austin Krajicek.
Chris Eubanks, who had a recurring role as a Tennis Channel analyst in recent years before making a career-best run to the Wimbledon quarterfinals in 2023, is playing for the U.S. Davis Cup team for the first time this week.
Introduced in 1900 and one of the oldest trophies in sports, Davis Cup is an annually contested “World Cup of Men’s Tennis.” Each year the best players in the world represent their countries in a battle to determine the sport’s best men’s tennis nation. Tennis Channel has carried Davis Cup action since its first year on air, in 2003.
The United States and Ukraine will play two singles matches on February 1. On Friday, Feb. 2, at 10 a.m. ET, they will compete in a doubles and two reverse singles matches. The winner of three of five matches will qualify for the Davis Cup Finals, set for Malaga, Spain, in November.
Former players Mark Knowles (@Knowlzee10s) and Jan-Michael Gambill (@JanmikeGambill) will respectively announce and provide commentary for the network’s Davis Cup-qualifier coverage. A native of the Bahamas, Knowles represented that country 29 times in Davis Cup play from 1989-2008. Gambill played for the United States in 1998 and 2000-2001.
The American Davis Cup team is captained by all-time doubles great Bob Bryan, who was a member of the most recent U.S. team to win the tournament, in 2007. Fritz, currently ranked world No. 9 in singles, has been as high as No. 5, and has had considerable success in team-tennis formats. He helped the United States take the inaugural United Cup championship in 2023, a few months after contributing to Team World’s Laver Cup-winning performance in 2022. Krajicek had a breakout year in 2023, claiming his first major doubles championship at Roland Garros (commonly referred to as the French Open) and reaching the World No. 1 doubles ranking. He also made it to the US Open doubles finals, where he lost to a team with Rajeev Ram, who won the event for the third consecutive year. Ram, one of the top doubles players in the world (currently No. 5), will pair with Krajicek on the U.S. Davis Cup team again this week.
Eubanks is one of the feel-good stories in sports in the past year. After being ranked around No. 200 in singles, he started working as an analyst with Tennis Channel in 2022 while still focusing on his playing career. In 2023, he had his best tennis season to date, winning his first ATP singles title in Mallorca, Spain, and rocketing to a personal high No. 29 singles ranking before the year was done. He upset No. 12 Cam Norrie and No. 5 Stefanos Tsitsipas during his Wimbledon run, and later reached the quarterfinals in his hometown of Atlanta.
Sabastian Korda completes this week’s U.S. Davis Cup roster. He is also following a sterling 2023 season in which he reached a career high of No. 25 in singles and made his way to the Australian Open quarterfinals.
Twenty-two other nations will compete for a chance to win the 2024 Davis Cup this week: Argentina, Belgium, Brazil, Canada, Chile, Chinese Taipei, Croatia, Czech Rep., Finland, France, Germany, Hungary, Israel, Kazakhstan, Netherlands, Peru, Portugal, Serbia, Slovakia, South Korea, Sweden and Switzerland. Matchups and schedules can be found on the Davis Cup website: https://www.daviscup.com/en/home.aspx.
Tennis Channel’s coverage of these events is available on the network’s website: (www.tennischannel.com/schedule).
Tennis Channel (www.tennischannel.com) and its sibling network T2, which are owned by Sinclair, Inc., are the only television-based multiplatform destinations dedicated to both the professional sport and tennis lifestyle. The networks have the most concentrated single-sport coverage in television in one of the world’s most voluminous sports, with multiple men’s and women’s tournaments and singles, doubles and mixed competition throughout the year. Tennis Channel and T2 have rights at the four majors – US Open, Wimbledon, Roland Garros (French Open) and Australian Open – and are the exclusive U.S. homes of all men’s ATP World Tour and women’s WTA Tour competitions, Davis Cup, Billie Jean King Cup, United Cup, and Laver Cup. Direct-to-consumer streaming service Tennis Channel Plus is available to everyone in the United States and allows subscribers to select from another 4,500 live and on-demand matches and award-winning content from short-form to films throughout the tennis season. Tennis Channel International brings live competition and network content to markets in Europe and Asia via digital subscription and free ad-supported streaming TV (FAST) channels. Additional platform www.tennis.com is the largest digital outlet dedicated to the sport. Tennis Channel also manages a network of close to 20 podcasts and FAST channel Pickleballtv, a partnership with the Professional Pickleball Association.
About Sinclair, Inc.
Sinclair, Inc. (Nasdaq: SBGI) is a diversified media company and a leading provider of local news and sports. The Company owns, operates and/or provides services to 185 television stations in 86 markets affiliated with all the major broadcast networks; owns Tennis Channel and multicast networks Comet, CHARGE!, TBD and The Nest; and owns and provides services to 21 regional sports network brands. Sinclair’s content is delivered via multiple platforms, including over-the-air, multi-channel video program distributors, and the nation’s largest streaming aggregator of local news content, NewsON. The Company regularly uses its website as a key source of Company information which can be accessed at www.sbgi.net.
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Eric Abner, Tennis Channel, 310-314-9445, eabner@tennischannel.com, @TennisChannelPR