Alabama men’s tennis suffered a 1-6 loss in its SEC opener against No. 3 ranked Texas on Saturday.
Coming into the match, Texas was three days removed from a team win at the Intercollegiate College Tennis Indoors National Championship, where they knocked off No. 1 ranked Ohio State to secure the title.
“We’re being thrown into the deep end right away, but our guys can swim pretty good,” head coach George Husack said of the matchup.
Alabama started the match off slowly, suffering a trio of 3-6 losses at all three doubles spots to relinquish the doubles point.
Despite an early break of serve by junior Andrii Zimnokh and freshman Jacob Olar, the No. 18 ranked doubles tandem in the country, the suffocating net play of the Longhorns was challenging to overcome. The other two doubles courts were unable to secure a break of serve throughout.
The Crimson Tide rallied and got on the board quickly in singles play. After a straight-sets loss by Olar at No. 4 singles, freshman Yoshka Sborowsky secured a comfortable 6-3, 6-4 victory over Texas’ Mariano Dedura-Palomero.
Sborowsky’s win was the first conference win of his college career and improved his singles record on the season to 3-2.
Alabama then lost consecutively at No. 3 and No. 1 singles, allowing Texas to clinch the match overall.
At No. 3 singles, freshman Vit Kalina started the match strong, securing the opening set 6-4 behind his patience in long, baseline exchanges. In the second and third sets, the powerful baseline hitting of No. 67-ranked Abel Forger took control of the match, leading to a 6-4, 0-6, 0-6 defeat for Kalina.
At No. 1 singles, Zimnokh battled against Texas’ Sebastian Gorzny, the No. 3 ranked singles player in the country. After a swift 3-6 loss in the first set, Zimnokh and Gorzny traded a pair of service breaks in the second as they moved towards a tiebreaker. An uncharacteristic forehand error by Zimnokh at 4-5 in the tiebreaker swung the momentum in Gorzny’s favor as he went on to win 6-3, 7-6(7).
After Texas had clinched the match, senior Carlos Gimenez Perez suffered a tightly-contested 5-7, 4-6 loss at No. 5 singles after late breaks of serve by Texas in both sets. Sophomore Matic Kriznik battled back from a set down on Court 2 to force a deciding 10-point tiebreaker, but was unable to secure a second victory for Alabama as he fell 4-6, 6-4, 5-10.
Despite the overall result, Husack was not discouraged by the performance of his young, inexperienced squad, who he noted has only two players who have played a full SEC season.
“Our guys, I loved how they stuck in there. There was a question of belief at times, but that’s natural and normal. But they hung in there the whole time and I’m really proud of them for that,” he said.
Looking ahead, Alabama has another big challenge in its next match as No. 5 ranked LSU makes its way to Tuscaloosa. The match is set for Monday at 1 p.m. CT.
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