SEATTLE – Washington men’s tennis continues to play some of its best tennis of the season, but despite threatening to break through against a top-25 opponent today, the Dawgs came up just short in a 4-2 loss to No. 22 Arizona State. It was the final home match of the year for the Huskies, as the team honored three seniors pre-match, celebrating the careers of Han-Chih Lin, Jim Hendrikx, and Heman Nama.
The match was played outside at Bill Quillian Stadium on a perfect sunny day that turned gray and windy midway through.
Trailing 1-3, the Huskies were even or leading on the final three singles courts, needing to win all three. Nedim Suko finished a victory on court four to bring the Dawgs within a point, but at the same moment on court one, 9th-ranked Sun Devil Murphy Cassone got a break of serve to take a 5-4 lead in the decisive third set against Cesar Bouchelaghem. Cassone then served it out to clinch a 5-7, 6-1, 6-4 win and get ASU over the top.
Hendrikx was up a set and in a second set tiebreak when ASU clinched, and he was denied a chance at earning a possible final home win.
“I don’t see one match that we played this weekend that we didn’t have chances to either win, or we did win a couple today. The guys fought super hard and we’re working with a certain purpose and working in a direction, and we’re starting to play better and better,” said Head Coach Rahim Esmail. “The guys’ mindset, they know what we need to do to continue to get better, so we’re playing our best tennis, so we’ll go to Ojai and leave it all out there. We’ll fight to the bitter end and see what we can do. There’s still a lot of tennis left to play this season, and we’ll be there to compete.”
Along with Suko’s 7-5, 7-6 win on the No. 4 court over Roi Ginat, the first Husky point of the day came from freshman Ivan Sodan, who defeated Martin Vergara Del Puerto, 6-3, 6-4, at No. 5 singles.
Little better angle of the Sodan slam and the Dubs ??#GoHuskies pic.twitter.com/e4jFPtD5OT
— Washington Men’s Tennis (@UW_MTennis) April 20, 2024
Lin came up short in his final home match at No. 3 singles to Jacob Bullard, 6-3, 6-2, and Dzianis Zharyn lost for just the second time in his past nine decisions, 6-3, 6-4, to Max McKennon at No. 2 singles.
The Dawgs also had a heartbreaking doubles point loss that came down to just a couple points in a tiebreaker at the No. 1 spot. First, Heman Nama and Suko had a 6-2 win at No. 3 doubles to give Nama a Senior Day…
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