Virginia Falls 4-3 at No. 21 Duke
March 30, 2018
DURHAM, N.C. – The No. 37 Virginia men’s tennis team (11-6, 4-2 ACC) fell 4-3 at No. 21 Duke (13-8, 4-2 ACC) on Friday (March 30) at Ambler Tennis Center in Durham, N.C.
The match was tied 3-3 after the Blue Devils won the doubles point and picked up wins at one and five singles while the Cavaliers won courts two through four. The match was decided by a battle at No. 6 singles with Freshman Kyrylo Tsygura (North Potomac, Md.) falling to Sean Sculley in a tiebreaker to decide the third set No. 6.
In doubles, sophomore Carl Soderlund (Stockholm, Sweden) and freshman Matthew Lord (Bloomfield, Conn.) picked up a 6-4 win on court two just as Duke won 6-3 on court three. Junior Aswin Lizen (Douglas, Island of Man) and freshman Gianni Ross (Chicago, Ill.) were knotted 6-6 on court one, sending their match to a tiebreaker. Duke’s Nick Stachowiak and Sean Sculley withstood three match points to come back to win the tiebreaker 9-7 to give the point to the Blue Devils.
Lord tied the match, 1-1, with a quick 6-4, 6-2 victory at four singles. Duke edged ahead with a win on court five, but Lizen tied things back up with a 7-5, 6-3 victory at two. Virginia took a 3-2 lead after Ross closed out a 6-1, 6-7, 6-3 victory over Nick Stachowiak at No. 3. Duke tied things up again when S̮ծԮԦderlund fell on court one.
On court six, Tsygura dropped his first match 6-4, but won the second 7-5 to force a third. He took a 3-1 lead in the third set, but Sculley came back and tied things up 4-4. Tsygura picked up a break to take a 5-4 lead, but Sculley broke right back to make it 5-5. Tsygura won a deuce point to keep the match tied 6-6 and force a tiebreaker to decide the set and match. Sculley prevailed 7-4 in the tiebreaker to give the Blue Devils the victory in a match that lasted four hours and 20 minutes.
The Cavaliers finish off the road trip by playing at No. 5 North Carolina on Sunday, April 1 at 1 p.m. Live scoring will be available through a link posted on VirginiaSports.com.
#21 Duke 4, #37 Virginia 3
Singles competition
1. #17 Nicolas Alvarez (DU) def. #38 Carl Soderlund (VA) 6-7 (5-7), 6-4, 6-3
2. #32 Aswin Lizen (VA) def. #113 Catalin Mateas (DU) 7-5, 6-3
3. #120 Gianni Ross (VA) def. Nick Stachowiak (DU) 6-1, 6-7 (2-7), 6-3
4. Matthew Lord (VA) def. Spencer Furman (DU) 6-4, 6-2
5. Robert Levine (DU) def. Ammar Alhaqbani (VA) 6-1, 4-6, 6-0
6. Sean Sculley (DU) def. Kyrylo Tsygura (VA) 6-4, 5-7, 7-6 (7-4)
Doubles competition
1. Sean Sculley/Nick Stachowiak (DU) def. Aswin Lizen/Gianni Ross (VA) 7-6 (9-7)
2. Carl Soderlund/Matthew Lord (VA) def. Catalin Mateas/Jason Lapidus (DU) 6-4
3. Ryan Dickerson/Spencer Furman (DU) def. Ammar Alhaqbani/Spencer Bozsik (VA) 6-3
Order of finish: Doubles (3,2,1); Singles (4,5,2,3,1,6)
T-4:21 A-320