Men's Tennis Gets Doubleheader Sweep on Sunday

Sunday, March 5

NEW ORLEANS

12:00 P.M.

Tulane University

Middle Tennessee

Rafael de Alba (left) and Billy Suarez

Men's Tennis Gets Doubleheader Sweep on Sunday

Mar 5, 2023 | Men's Tennis

NEW ORLEANS – The Tulane men's tennis team stepped in and out of conference in defeating #28 Middle Tennessee 4-3 and Alcorn State by a perfect 7-0 tally Sunday at City Park Tennis Center.

The Green Wave, who came into the weekend ranked 62nd nationally, improved to 6-5 on the season.

The Blue Raiders are now 12-5, while Alcorn is 2-12.

The contest against Middle Tennessee was a rematch of last weekend's 4-3 decision at the Blue Gray Championships, which was won by the Blue Raiders.

On Sunday, Tulane started by clinching a doubles point that took nearly an hour. After an 11-9 tiebreaker, the Green Wave's No. 3 team of Billy Suarez and Rafael de Alba got the home team on the scoreboard first. The No. 2 team of Fynn Kuenkler and Luka Petrovic also won 6-4 a bit earlier.

Tulane got singles wins by Petrovic (3-6, 6-4, 6-4) at No. 2 and Suarez (7-5, 6-3) at No. 3, while MTSU got three wins of its own at Nos. 1, 4 and 5.

That meant it all came down to the singles match at No. 6 between the Olive and Blue's de Alba and Middle's Pavel Motl. Motl won the first set 6-3 and then the two became embroiled in a marathon tiebreaker to decide the second. Eventually, de Alba secured an 18-16 win to push the proceedings to a third set after saving an incredible seven match points.

In the third set, Motl began to battle cramping and de Alba capitalized to emerge with a 6-3 win to give the overall team victory to Tulane.

The 🌊 pulled out a HUGE 4-3 win over #28 Middle Tennessee Sunday afternoon!

Here are the post-match thoughts from head coach Mark Booras:#RollWave pic.twitter.com/VhDHhylKBO
— Tulane Men's Tennis (@GreenWaveMTenn) March 5, 2023

In the late afternoon match, the Green Wave got a pair of 6-0 doubles victories by Charlie Barry/Benji Jacobson at No. 1 and Kuenkler/Sam Scherer at No. 2 to get that point.

In singles, Tulane's entire lineup breezed to straight-set wins.

The Green Wave is back home on Thursday when Florida Gulf Coast visits for a noon match that will be carried on ESPN+.

#62 Tulane 4, #28 Middle Tennessee 3
Singles
1. #69 Stijn Slump (MTSU) def. #74 Fynn Kuenkler (MTLN) 6-3, 6-2
2. Luka Petrovic (MTLN) def. Francisco Rocha (MTSU) 3-6, 6-4, 6-4
3. Billy Suarez (MTLN) def. #98 O. Brostrom Poulsen (MTSU) 7-5, 6-3
4. Ondrej Horak (MTSU) def. Alex Bancila (MTLN) 6-2, 6-3
5. Marcel Kamrowski (MTSU) def. Luc Hoeijmans (MTLN) 6-7 (3-7), 6-4, 6-4
6. Rafael de Alba (MTLN) def. Pavel Motl (MTSU) 3-6, 7-6 (18-16), 6-3

Doubles
1. #44 O. Brostrom Poulsen/Francisco Rocha (MTSU) def. Charlie Barry/Benji Jacobson (MTLN) 6-4
2. Fynn Kuenkler/Luka Petrovic (MTLN) def. Pavel Motl/Stijn Slump (MTSU) 6-4
3. Rafael de Alba/Billy Suarez (MTLN) def. Ondrej Horak/Shu Matsuoka (MTSU) 7-6 (11-9)

#62 Tulane 7, Alcorn State 0
Singles
1. #74 Fynn Kuenkler (MTLN) def. Dakota Fernandez (ALCORN) 6-0, 6-0
2. Alex Bancila (MTLN) def. Nikola Kijac (ALCORN) 6-2, 6-1
3. Luc Hoeijmans (MTLN) def. Luka Rodic (ALCORN) 6-1, 6-2
4. Sam Scherer (MTLN) def. Luka Andonov (ALCORN) 6-4, 6-4
5. Charlie Barry (MTLN) def. Arne Sohmer (ALCORN) 6-2, 6-1
6. Benji Jacobson (MTLN) def. Isaac Santitto (ALCORN) 6-0, 6-3

Doubles
1. Charlie Barry/Benji Jacobson (MTLN) def. Dakota Fernandez/Isaac Santitto (ALCORN) 6-0
2. Fynn Kuenkler/Sam Scherer (MTLN) def. Luka Rodic/Nikola Kijac (ALCORN) 6-0
3. Alex Bancila/Billy Suarez (MTLN) vs. Luka Andonov/Arne Sohmer (ALCORN) 4-3, unfinished