Men’s tennis captures doubles point, loses 3rd consecutive USC matchup

The Bruins received bad news in more ways than one over the weekend.

After taking the doubles point, No. 33 UCLA men’s tennis (11-5, 4-3 Pac-12) dropped all its singles matches on Saturday in a 6-1 defeat to No. 15 USC (17-6, 5-2) at Marks Stadium.

The Bruins were without their No. 1 singles player, senior Keegan Smith, who sustained an undisclosed injury leading up to the match. It is unclear when or if Smith will return to the court this season, but the blue and gold should expect to be without their star player for the foreseeable future, according to coach Billy Martin.

“He’s got an injury,” Martin said. “He’s not capable of playing, unfortunately, which is obviously a detriment to the strength of our team.”

The lone bright spot for the Bruins came during doubles play. The junior tandem of Roscoe Bellamy and Matthew Tsolakyan was victorious first taking down USC’s duo of Jake Sands and Lodewijk Weststrate 6-1 on court three. The Trojans struck back, with the undefeated doubles pair Stefan Dostanic and Bradley Frye securing a 6-3 victory over senior Bryce Pereira and junior Patrick Zahraj.

The doubles point came down to court one, where junior Govind Nanda and sophomore Drew Baird found themselves in a tiebreaker match with the nation’s No. 5 pair, Daniel Cukierman and Riley Smith. Baird sealed the deal with a serve Cukierman could not return, winning the tiebreaker 8-6 and giving UCLA a 1-0 match lead.

However, the Bruins were unable to win a single set during singles play. Cukierman and Smith both avenged their doubles loss to Nanda and Baird, as Cukierman beat Nanda by scores of 6-2 and 6-0 while Smith defeated Baird 6-3 and 6-4.

Sands and Weststrate also returned the favor to their doubles opponents, defeating Tsolakyan and Bellamy, respectively, while Dostanic and Frye remained flawless on the day after taking down graduate student Sam Feit and redshirt senior Ben Goldberg, respectively.

“We never like losing, but especially to them,” Goldberg said. “They were firing on all cylinders, but it stings more losing to them, that’s for sure.”

UCLA will have its Senior Day on Wednesday when it plays No. 31 Pepperdine before traveling down to San Diego for the Pac-12 tournament. Goldberg said his last home match will be emotional.

“There might be some tears,” Goldberg said. “I’ll try to treat it as any other day. I’ve never taken any of this for granted. I’ve lived each day like it was a Senior Day, just enjoying every moment. I’ll treat it no differently because I’ve appreciated every moment at UCLA.”