Men's Tennis falls again, drops to 1-5

After the Friday match against Sacred Heart was postponed due to snow, the UConn men’s tennis team was not able stop their current slide as they lost a match, 6-1, on the road to Brown at Providence, R.I., and dropped their record to 1-5.

The postponed match against Sacred Heart will be made up at some point between now and the Big East Championship plays, though no official date has been announced yet.

As for the match against the Brown Bears, the Huskies found themselves in a familiar theme over the recent stretch as they received a cohesive effort from junior Ryan Carr and sophomore Wayne Harrell in the doubles when they toppled Sam Fife and William Spector of the Bears, 8-7 (5) at the No. 1 spot.

“They are playing really well,” freshman Zac McEntee said. “They are kind of on a hot streak right now so they are just riding it out. Wayne is serving big and Ryan at the net is just finishing with velocity.”
UConn wasn’t able to secure the point in doubles, however, as the duos of James Cohen/Mark HoSang and Andrew Ginzberg/Josh Palmer fell to Lucas Da Silviera/Justin To and Jacob Laser/David Neff, respectively, at the No. 2 and No. 3 spot.

The Huskies’ fortune did not improve in the singles either as they dropped five out six matches there. Daniel Hirschberg (Brown) beat Harrell, 6-2, 6-1
at No. 1; Neff won against Carr, 6-1, 6-0 at No. 2; Da Silviera defeated HoSang, 6-2, 6-0
at No. 3; Ginzberg was able to pick up the only point for UConn in another long battle by him at the No. 4 spot by edging Laser in, 6-3, 1-6, (10-6); To overcame Cohen, 6-1, 6-1
at No. 6 and Ivan Kravtchenko (Brown) topped McEntee, 6-1, 6-2.

On Ginzberg’s win, McEntee said, “He’s been playing well lately, so it’s just really good for him to come up with a big win against Brown, which is a really good team. He was making more plays this time and was executing better. It really came down to a few points and he pulled it off in the tiebreaker set.”
As for the team’s struggles in singles play lately, McEntee added, “I think we just need to get the momentum off early by winning the doubles point, and it’ll really carry over into the singles. Sometimes when we can’t take the doubles point, it’s pretty tough to get motivated again. We also need to execute better when we get in positions to win big points or sets.”
The Huskies’ next matches are scheduled from March 18 through March 20, as they take on Nichols College, Bradley University and Embry-Riddle Aeronautical University in Florida.