Men’s tennis suffers disappointing losses against ranked SEC opponents
Freshman Martin Redlicki and his sophomore doubles partner Mackenzie McDonald won their matchup with Georgia, but UCLA’s failure to command the other two doubles matches led to the team’s eventual defeat. (Hannah Ye/Daily Bruin)
By Korbin Placet
Feb. 2, 2015 1:28 a.m.
The UCLA men’s tennis team went into the Southeastern Conference/Pac-12 Challenge this year trying to repeat history, only to come up short in both dual matches this past weekend.
Last year, when UCLA went up against SEC powerhouses University of Georgia and University of Florida, the Bruins won both matches, despite having doubles trouble.
This year, the Bruins experienced the same doubles difficulties, only this time they weren’t able to best either team in singles.
The No. 4 Bruins (3-2) started the challenge weekend by playing the No. 7 Georgia Bulldogs (3-1). Coach Billy Martin said the Bulldogs came out aggressive in doubles play, which put the Bruins behind early in the dual match.
“It was very, very disappointing,” Martin said. “You know it was kind of ironic that our No. 1 (doubles) team that wasn’t playing very well (earlier in the season), played pretty darn good this weekend. The other two teams did not. It usually has been the opposite.”
Freshman Martin Redlicki attributed his doubles win with sophomore Mackenzie McDonald to their improved serving and on-point volleying.
After losing the doubles point, the Bruins evened the match 2-2 in singles play. It came down to junior Karue Sell and sophomore Joseph Di Giulio needing to win both of their respective singles matches.
“The entire area was packed with Georgia fans,” Di Giulio said. “They weren’t too rowdy. It was just during the end of the match when it came to Karue and I that it got pretty loud. It was definitely a tough match, so maybe the crowd was a little bit of a factor.”
The Bruins ended up losing the dual match to the Bulldogs 4-2.
In less than 24 hours, the Bruins had to readjust and get focused for their next dual match against the No. 17 Florida Gators (4-2).
Although the Bruins dropped the doubles point against the Gators, they were able to even it up in singles play. For UCLA to achieve victory, however, they needed Di Giulio to prevail in his match against Florida’s Oliver Landert.
After splitting the first two sets, Di Giulio said he was confident that he could pull out the win.
“I was right there the whole entire time,” Di Giulio said.
Tied 3-3 in the third set, Landert was up to serve. Di Giulio stepped up the defensive play to take it to a no-advantage deuce, but in the end, Landert won the game. From that moment on, Landert would have the momentum to break Di Giulio’s serve, and he would go on to win the match 6-3, 3-6, 6-3.
“I let my serve get to me a little bit because I knew that the entire match was up to me,” Di Giulio said.
The Gators won the dual match 4-3.
Di Giulio said that even though the Bruins had a disappointing weekend, there were a lot of positives. He said they plan to take what they learned from the matches to get ready for the next couple of dual matches and get into the ITA Division I National Men’s Team Indoor Championship.
“Overall, I think our team is there,” Di Giulio said. “Those were both winnable matches. It was good learning experience for our team. We know what we need to work on. We definitely need to step it up a bit. We are excited for indoors in Chicago and to show that we are a lot better than what our weekend results show.”
