HOUSTON – The University of Texas Rio Grande Valley (UTRGV) Vaqueros men's tennis team was defeated, 7-0, Friday by the Rice Owls at the George R. Brown Tennis Center in Houston.
Rice (1-0) picked up wins on the first and third doubles courts to take the 1-0 lead. UTRGV's No. 2 duo of redshirt junior
Sam Whitehead and freshman
Isaac Smyth captured a solid 6-3 win in their first spring match together. This was Smyth's debut in the Vaqueros lineup.
The Owls secured the team victory with straight-set wins on the fourth, second and third singles courts. The Vaqueros (0-2) battled and pushed two matches to third set tiebreakers despite playing from behind throughout the match.
Freshman
Loic Young Kriegel picked up his first singles set win as he rolled by
Eduardo Morais, 6-0, in the opener of the No. 5 match. But Morais came back to win in a third-set tiebreaker. Whitehead played his first career singles match at No. 1 and dropped a back-and-forth duel to
Arthus De La Bassetiere. Whitehead won a tight first set, 7-6 (7:4), then fell behind 5-4 in the second. He showed grit to force the tiebreaker at 6-all, but Bassetiere held on to win the set, 7-6 (7:4) and force a 10-point tiebreaker in the third. They went point for point and Whitehead fought off three match points after erasing a four-point lead, but Bassetiere took it, 14:12.
UTRGV's next match is set for Jan. 25 at UTSA.
Results
Doubles (1, 2, 3)
1. Arthus De La Bassetiere/Kabeer Kapasi (RU) def.
Ivo Isqueiro/
Loic Young Kriegel (UTRGV) 6-3
2.
Sam Whitehead/
Isaac Smyth (UTRGV) def. Eduardo Morais/Yair Sarouk (RU), 6-3
3. Petro Kuzmenok/Joshua Mandelbaum (RU) def.
Will Roberts/
Eduardo Menezes (UTRGV) 6-3
Singles (4, 2, 3, 6, 5, 1)
1. Arthus De La Bassetiere (RU) def.
Sam Whitehead (UTRGV) 6-7 (4:7), 7-6 (7:4), 1-0 (14:12)
2. Petro Kuzmenok (RU) def.
Ivo Isqueiro (UTRGV) 6-1, 6-2
3. Emir Sendogan (RU) def.
Santiago Serrano (UTRGV) 6-2, 6-3
4. Kabeer Kapasi (RU) def.
Will Roberts (UTRGV) 6-2, 6-1
5. Eduardo Morais (RU) def.
Loic Young Kriegel (UTRGV) 0-6, 6-4, 1-0 (10:6)
6. Yair Sarouk (RU) def.
Paolo Bonaguro (UTRGV) 7-5, 6-2
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