The University of Alabama at Birmingham Athletics
UAB Men's Tennis Team Falls To No. 30 Mississippi State
2/2/2005 12:00:00 AM | Men's Tennis
Feb. 2, 2005
STARKVILLE, Miss. ----- The UAB tennis team, coming off back-to-back wins to open its season, dropped its first dual match of the campaign here Wednesday, falling to No. 30 Mississippi State, 6-1.
The Blazers (2-1) and Bulldogs (1-1) played indoors at MSU's two-court McCarthy Gym because of inclement weather.
MSU won the doubles point with victories at the No. 1 and 3 positions to take a 1-0 lead. The Blazers' Sebastian Falk and Thomas Werkmann captured an 8-5 win at No. 2 doubles with an 8-5 win over State's Ivan Bjelica and Florent Girod.
The Mississippi State wins at No. 1 and 2 singles spelled the difference for the Bulldogs. Both matches were tight, but State prevailed in each, winning 6-4, 6-4 decisions at both positions. Luis Carvalho defeated UAB's Falk at the No. 1 spot while the Blazers' Anton Mavrin lost by the same margin at No. 2 to Bjelica.
"If we could have pulled out the doubles, who knows what may have happened?," said UAB head coach Derek Tarr. "Give Mississippi State credit, though. They are a very good team and their depth was very strong. This is a very tough place to play. The surface is different from anything we usually play on, but still, I thought we could have played better. I was a little disappointed in our intensity in the match."
UAB got its only win at No. 4 singles as Andre Maier defeated MSU's Jose-Carlos Pinto, 6-2, 4-6, (10-7).
The Blazers' next action will come next Tuesday, Feb. 8 when they play North Alabama at 1:00 p.m. The match is scheduled to be played at the Brook Island Racquet Club.
