March 17, 2007
Montgomery, Ala. - The 40th-ranked Auburn men's tennis team battled it out until the end with 32nd-ranked Virginia Commonwealth at the Blue Gray Tennis Classic. The Rams captured the doubles point and three singles to take the win, 4-2, on Saturday. Auburn moves to 9-5 on the year.
"It was a really close match today," head coach Eric Shore said. "We really should have won the doubles point but it seems like we can't pull of these close matches. We will just have to regroup and prepare for the upcoming week against Georgia and Tennessee."
The Rams captured the doubles point, taking all three doubles. Alex Schweizer and Robbert Lathouwers looked in position to take No. 1 doubles over Arnau Le Cloerec and Petr Olsak, but the VCU pair prevailed, winning 9-8. No. 2 and No. 3 doubles were no different as both came down to the wire. VCU's Emil Lindgren and Sebasitan Ripoll got past Alexey Tsyrenov and Terence Nugent, 8-5, while Sergi Arumi and Sebastien Deridder defeated Pawel Dilaj and Stephen Nash,k 8-7.
Auburn picked up wins in singles on court one and four from Schweizer and Dilaj. Schweizer made easy work of Olsak, 6-4, 6-4, while Dilaj also defeated his opponent, Damien Lacombe in straight sets, 6-4, 6-2. Auburn took the first set on court five and six but VCU pulled even in the second. Georges-Alexandre Israel took the third set on court six for the win over Milan Krnjetin, 2-6, 6-3, 6-3. Lukas Marsoun's court five matched did not finish.
VCU finished off Auburn on court two and three with third set rallies over Lathouwers and Tsyrenov. VCU's Arumi took the first set 7-6, but Lathouwers rebounded back for a quick 6-2, win in the second. Arumi just edged out Lathouwers in the third, 7-6, for the win. The same was true on court three with VCU's Lindgren and Auburn's Tsyrenov. Lindgren won the first set, 7-5, before Tsyrenov took set two, 6-2. The third was decided 6-3 by Lindgren.
Auburn returns to action on Friday in Athens versus Georgia.