Men’s Tennis: No. 66 Louisiana Puts Up Valiant Effort, Comes Up Short At Rice, 4-3

Louisiana Puts Up Valiant Effort, Comes Up Short At Rice, 4-3 

HOUSTON – No. 66 Louisiana Men’s Tennis (16-5), put up a solid effort against the Rice Owls (8-7), but came up short on Tuesday afternoon, falling 4-3 at the George R. Brown Tennis Center.

Louisiana got wins in singles from junior Jamie Fraser and freshman Kacper Dworak, but unfortunately for Louisiana the match had already been decided by the time the wins came for the Ragin’ Cajuns.  For Dworak the win was his third straight and Fraser locked up his second straight win in singles.

HOW IT HAPPENED (Doubles): Louisiana got off to a 1-0 start when the doubles point was taken by the Ragin’ Cajuns.  At No. 3 doubles, Louisiana’s pairing of Fraser and junior Elio Lago took down Rice’s duo of Mohamed Abdel-Aziz and Campbell Salmon, 6-1, to give Louisiana the first doubles point.

At No. 1, No. 53 senior Arthur Libaud and junior Pearse Dolan dropped a match that involved two nationally ranked doubles pairings, falling 6-3 to No. 40 Eric Rutledge and Sumit Sarkar.  At No. 3, Louisiana would lock up the doubles point and a 1-0 lead heading into singles, then Dworak and freshman Jan Galka outlasted the Rice pairing of Jacob Eskeland and Daniel Warren in a tiebreaker, winning 7-6(5).

HOW IT HAPPENED (Singles): At No. 5 singles the first point for Rice came when Abdel-Aziz won against Lago in straight sets, 6-1, 6-1.  Rice then took a 2-1 lead when at No. 2, Libaud fell to Eskeland in straight sets, 6-3, 6-0.

Rice got one win away from locking up the match with a win at No. 3 when Rutledge won 7-5, 7-5, against Dolan.  The match was won by Rice at No. 1 when Galka fell to Sarkar in straight sets, 7-5, 6-4.

Louisiana got its two wins in singles, starting at No. 4 with Fraser coming away with a solid straight set, 6-4, 7-5, win.  At No. 6, Dworak worked hard through what became a three-set battle against Salmon, winning 6-2, 3-6, 1-0(4), to give Louisiana its final singles win of the day.

UP NEXT FOR THE CAJUNS: Louisiana returns to Cajun Courts on Wednesday, Mar. 13, for a doubleheader against Xavier (La.), with the first match starting at 5 p.m. and the second beginning at 6:30 p.m.

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Men’s Tennis: No. 66 Ragin’ Cajuns Get Back To Winning Form, Sweeps Doubleheader At PVAMU 

PRAIRIE VIEW, Texas – After dropping its first match in two weeks, No. 66 Louisiana Men’s Tennis (16-4) got back to its winning ways with a doubleheader sweep of Prairie View A&M (2-14), taking both matches 4-0 at the PVAMU Tennis Courts.

Junior Silvio Cocito-Monoc and freshman Kacper Dworak each got two wins in singles to help lead the way for Louisiana on the day.  Juniors Elio Lago and Jamie Fraser, along with sophomores Pierce Gilheany and Dominik Koenig each grabbed wins as well to give Louisiana a dominating day at the courts.

HOW IT HAPPENED (First Match): Louisiana got the day started in dominating fashion, getting wins in the top two singles slots from Lago and Fraser.  Lago took down Xavier Lawrence at No. 1 singles in straight sets, 6-0, 6-2 and Fraser got his win at No. 2 against Jorge Caballero, 6-1, 6-2.

Dworak snagged himself a win at No. 3 against Rodrigo Yoshikata in straight sets, 6-1, 6-1.  And Cocito-Monoc capped off the first match with a straight set win himself, at No. 6, 6-1, 6-3, over Zachary Suico to give Louisiana the 4-0 win in the first match of the day.

HOW IT HAPPENED (Match Two): In the second match of the day, Louisiana got its win from the heart of the lineup, with Dworak once again playing at No. 3, taking down Kevin Ugarteche in straight sets, 6-2, 6-1.  At No. 4 Gilheany locked himself up a win over Suico, 6-1, 6-2 to give Louisiana two wins in the first match.

At No. 6, Cocito-Monoc once again took care of business, winning in straight sets, 6-1, 6-3 over Yoshikata.  Louisiana’s final point came at No. 5, where Koenig, who was up 3-0 in the first set, got his win when Taqel Lewis defaulted and it led to Louisiana locking up a 4-0 win and a sweep of the doubleheader.

UP NEXT FOR THE CAJUNS: Louisiana will stay in Texas, with a matchup against Rice in Houston, Texas on Tuesday, March 5, with first serve set for 2 p.m.