Sunday, February 6
Houston, Texas
Noon
Rice University
3
vs
4
Louisiana
Ragin' Cajuns Rally Past Owls
2/6/2022 4:39:00 PM | Men's Tennis
Owls head to Austin to face Texas on Friday
In Brief: Louisiana stormed back from a tight loss in doubles to win four singles matches, three of them going the full three sets, to defeat Rice 4-3 at the George R. Brown Tennis Center on Sunday. The Ragin' Cajuns improved to 5-1 while the Owls dropped to 4-2.
Doubles: Rice captured the doubles point for the fifth consecutive match thanks to a rally by Sumit Sarkar and Haoyuan Huang at the first line. Louisiana took the early advantage with a win at the second line, but Trinity Grear and AJ Valenty evened things with a 6-4 win at the third position. Sarkar and Huang dug themselves out of a 4-0 hole to take their match 7-5 and give the Owls the early lead.
Singles: The teams split the opening six sets of singles and Rice quickly extended the lead to 3-0 thanks to swift straight-set wins by Campbell Salmon and Grear. While Louisiana held its advantage at the second line to cut the margin to 3-1, the final three courts each were taken to third sets. The Owls struck back on two courts to force third sets but could not maintain their momentum on each court in the third as the Ragin' Cajuns grabbed wins on each to tie the match at 3-3. The decisive match came at the fourth line in between Adam Oscislawski and Kacper Dworak. Dworak burst out to a 4-0 lead but Oscislawski rebounded to cut the lead to 5-4 before Dworak closed the match out.
Efe Ustundag: "Starting down 4-0 at No. 1 doubles and losing pretty quickly at No. 2, it looked like we were going to start down 1-0, but Sumit and Tony raised their level of tennis and were able to shift the point in our direction. I have to give a lot of credit to Louisiana for coming out strong to take three first sets in singles. They are a team of fighters and they didn't let the quick losses at five and six bother them. Credit to Trinity and Campbell for getting off the court quickly. At the end of the day, I think this match was won by a team that wanted it more. The freshmen will have to learn and grow from this and learn how much bigger each match is (during the dual season)."
Up Next: The Owls will hit the road for the first time in 2022 when they travel to Austin on Friday to face Texas at 5:00 p.m. The Longhorns were ranked ninth in both of last week's college tennis polls.
Doubles: Rice captured the doubles point for the fifth consecutive match thanks to a rally by Sumit Sarkar and Haoyuan Huang at the first line. Louisiana took the early advantage with a win at the second line, but Trinity Grear and AJ Valenty evened things with a 6-4 win at the third position. Sarkar and Huang dug themselves out of a 4-0 hole to take their match 7-5 and give the Owls the early lead.
Singles: The teams split the opening six sets of singles and Rice quickly extended the lead to 3-0 thanks to swift straight-set wins by Campbell Salmon and Grear. While Louisiana held its advantage at the second line to cut the margin to 3-1, the final three courts each were taken to third sets. The Owls struck back on two courts to force third sets but could not maintain their momentum on each court in the third as the Ragin' Cajuns grabbed wins on each to tie the match at 3-3. The decisive match came at the fourth line in between Adam Oscislawski and Kacper Dworak. Dworak burst out to a 4-0 lead but Oscislawski rebounded to cut the lead to 5-4 before Dworak closed the match out.
Efe Ustundag: "Starting down 4-0 at No. 1 doubles and losing pretty quickly at No. 2, it looked like we were going to start down 1-0, but Sumit and Tony raised their level of tennis and were able to shift the point in our direction. I have to give a lot of credit to Louisiana for coming out strong to take three first sets in singles. They are a team of fighters and they didn't let the quick losses at five and six bother them. Credit to Trinity and Campbell for getting off the court quickly. At the end of the day, I think this match was won by a team that wanted it more. The freshmen will have to learn and grow from this and learn how much bigger each match is (during the dual season)."
Up Next: The Owls will hit the road for the first time in 2022 when they travel to Austin on Friday to face Texas at 5:00 p.m. The Longhorns were ranked ninth in both of last week's college tennis polls.
Team Stats
#1 Doubles Match
#2 Doubles Match
#3 Doubles Match
Order of Finish:
2,3,1
#1 Singles Match
123
Kajin, Karlo / 0 [LA]
606
461
#2 Singles Match
12
Sanchez Gonzalez, Al / 0 [LA]
67
25
#3 Singles Match
123
Fillat Gimenez, Orio / 0 [LA]
646
261
#4 Singles Match
123
Dworak, Kacper / 0 [LA]
276
654
#5 Singles Match
12
Vasil Dimitrov / 0 [LA]
13
66
#6 Singles Match
12
Ferrer Chueca, Alejo / 0 [LA]
11
66
Order of Finish:
6,5,2,1,3,4
Players Mentioned
/ Men's Tennis
/ Men's Tennis
/ Men's Tennis
/ Men's Tennis
/ Men's Tennis
/ Men's Tennis
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