Men’s tennis rebounds from slump with weekend wins against Washington, Oregon
By Lila Abramson
April 4, 2011 12:53 a.m.
After consecutive losses to rivals USC, California and Stanford, the UCLA men’s tennis team needed a serious morale boost. This weekend, it got just that.
A string of recent setbacks left the Bruins 0-2 in the Pac-10, but they came back to defeat Washington 5-2 on Friday and bested Oregon 7-0 on Saturday.
Any doubts about whether the Bruins could handle Washington’s toughness were put to rest early in the match.
No. 16 UCLA (13-5, 2-2 Pac-10) fared well in singles play against No. 20 Washington (14-6, 1-1), winning four straight-set matches.
In the featured match of the day, freshman Daniel Kosakowski, the No. 33-ranked player in the nation, bested No. 68 Kyle McMorrow, one of the Huskies’ top players.
The real drama came during doubles play, when UCLA’s team of freshman Adrien Puget and redshirt sophomore Alex Brigham rallied to win the tiebreaker and upset Washington’s McMorrow and Jeevan Nedunchezhiyan, who are ranked No. 31 in doubles.
Puget and Brigham trailed 4-6 in the tiebreaker and fought off two match points before they could win the match and secure the doubles point for the Bruins.
Saturday, UCLA faced a less challenging opponent in Oregon.
The Bruins won the doubles point easily, with wins on all three courts, and Puget and Brigham came out on top against the Ducks’ best in Robin Cambier and Alex Rovello.
In singles, the Bruins looked as strong as ever as they swept the Ducks yet again. Kosakowski registered a 7-5, 6-0 win against Rovello on court No. 1 and freshman Clay Thompson was able to beat Cambier 7-5, 6-1 on court No. 3.
UCLA has not sustained a winning streak since February and needs to find some consistency with the regular season coming to a close at the end of the month. The Bruins will look to continue improving their Pac-10 record when they take on Arizona on Friday.
Compiled by Lila Abramson, Bruin Sports contributor.
