The University of Alabama at Birmingham Athletics
Men's Tennis Edged By No. 13 Auburn, 4-3
2/18/2003 12:00:00 AM | Men's Tennis
Feb. 18, 2003
BIRMINGHAM, Ala. ----- The UAB men's tennis team (4-3) narrowly lost to No. 13 Auburn, 4-3 (6-0), here Tuesday afternoon at Brook Highland Racquet Club.
"For the most part, I think we fought hard against a very good Auburn team" said UAB head coach Derek Tarr. "They are a legitimate top-20 team. At some positions, we played very, very well, but we are going to have to play well at all positions if we're going to beat a team like this. We have more opportunities during the year to defeat top competition, but I think we need to improve our doubles. Overall, I thought it was a pretty good effort on our part."
The Tigers took the doubles point by winning at the No. 1 and No. 3 spots. Andrew Colombo and Tom George of Auburn defeated UAB's Bastian Gruendler and Kristijan Mitrovski, 8-5, in the No. 1 match. At the No. 3 spot, Tigers Rameez Junaid and Andre Boz were victorious over UAB's Patrick Suhrbier and Sansaruz Zaman, 8-6. In the No. 2 doubles match, UAB's Dino Mancarella and Andre Maier beat AU's Gabor Zolton Pelua and Markus Schiller, 8-4.
In singles, the teams split the six matches. UAB won at the No. 3, No. 4 and No. 6 spots with all three matches going to the third set. Blazer Maier defeated Auburn's Pelua, 6-3, 3-6, 6-3 in the No. 3 match. At the No. 4 spot, UAB's Mitrovski dropped the first set to Auburn's Schiller, 3-6, but rallied to win the match, 3-6, 6-2, 6-2. Mancarella of UAB beat AU's Boz, 6-3, 3-6, 6-2.
Auburn's Junaid won at the No. 1 spot, defeating UAB's Andreev, 6-0, 6-3. In the No. 2 match, Colombo of Auburn was victorious over Blazer Gruendler, 6-4, 7-5, while at the No. 5 spot, AU's George beat UAB's Zaman, 6-0, 6-2.
Next, UAB travels to Johnson City, Tenn., where it will face East Tennessee State on Saturday, February 22 at 1 p.m. before taking on Old Dominion on Sunday, February 23 at 1 p.m.
