MOBILE, Ala. – The Old Dominion men's tennis team opened Sun Belt Conference play on Saturday afternoon dropping a 4-3 battle at South Alabama.
"We saw today that conference matches are played with a different intensity. Both the doubles and the dual match came down to the wire," said ODU Head Coach Dominik Mueller. "Bottom line is that we can't lose all six first sets. We showed tremendous hearts getting back into four of those matches, but at the end we had to win three out of those four and that was too much to overcome."
Doubles saw all three matches go to tiebreakers, with the Monarchs taking wins at the one and three spots to claim the team point. At line one, Younes Lalami and Brandon Perez won a 7-2 tie breaker to claim that match. After South Alabama won a 7-5 tiebreaker at line two, Francois Le Tallec and Cosme Rolland De Ravel took a 12-10 tiebreaker for the Monarchs point.
In singles, the host Jaguars recorded the first two wins before ODU evened the match behind a Codie van Schalkwyk 3-6, 6-0, 6-0 win at line four to tie the match at two-all. Le Tallec gave ODU a 3-2 lead following a 6-7, 6-2, 6-2 win at line two. USA won the last two matches, including a deciding win that went over three hours.
ODU (8-8, 0-1) heads to Troy to take on the Trojans on Sunday morning at 11 a.m. EDT.
SOUTH ALABAMA 4, ODU 3
Doubles
Younes Lalami/Brandon Perez (ODU) def. Jack Clements/Maxime St-Hilaire 7-6 (7-2)
Sebastien Collard/Martin Bugaj (USA) def. Luca Maldoner/Jakob Cadonau 7-6 (7-5)
Francois Le Tallec/Cosme Rolland De Ravel (ODU) def. Louis Delcour/Juan Accossatto 7-6 (12-10)
Order of Finish: 1,2,3
Singles
Sebastien Collard (USA) def. Younes Lalami 6-2, 6-0
Francois Le Tallec (ODU) def. Maxime St-Hilaire 6-7, 6-2, 6-2
Louis Delcour (USA) def. Cosme Rolland De Ravel 6-4, 6-7, 6-3
Codie van Schalkwyk (ODU) def. Jack Clements 3-6, 6-0, 6-0
Martin Bugaj (USA) def. Jakob Cadonau 7-6, 5-7, 6-4
Javier Montoya (USA) def. Luca Maldoner 6-2, 6-2
Order of Finish: 1,6,4,2,3,5
Men's Tennis Drops Sun Belt Conference Opener 4-3 At South Alabama
Codie van Schalkwyk