EUGENE,Ore. (January 29, 2004) -- On the first day of its three day road trip, the BYU men's tennis team (No. 68) fell to No. 60-ranked Oregon Ducks 5-2 Thursday night in Eugene. The Cougars fall to 2-1 on the season while Oregon moves to 2-0.
"In college tennis, everybody is so good," head coach Brad Pearce said. "There will be a lot of split matches. It's hard to win day after day at one two and three. We saw that today."
With Oregon gaining the early advantage in doubles play, the Cougars had a hard time recovering from the deficit later in singles competition. Top seeded Erik Nyman and Nima Roshan struggled to get past the Duck duo falling 8-5.
"Our doubles is still struggling," Pearce said. "We missed Jose Lechuga in the doubles and singles lineups today. Having Jose out of the doubles play is so tough. We need that first point to gain the early confidence and we just didn't get it."
Freshman Chip Hand pulled off a big win for the Cougars defeating Marcus Schiller in a three-set thriller 7-6, 4-6, 6-2. Hand's win contributed to one of the two points for BYU.
Another highlight for BYU was Ivan Kokurin's win over Aaron Spencer posting a 7-6, 6-3 victory. Kokurin, from Tashkent, Uzbekistan, is a new recruit who joined the Cougar Squad only three weeks ago and has added more depth to coach Pearce's lineup.
The BYU men's tennis team will put this loss in the books and look to more successful results against an equally tough Louisiana-Lafayette team tomorrow at Noon, also played in Eugene.
"Tomorrow is a good match-up for us against Louisiana," Pearce said. "I think we'll be ready."
Following the match against Louisiana, the Cougars will travel north to Seattle to face their highest ranked opponent of the season, the eleventh ranked Washington Huskies Saturday.
BYU vs. OREGONDoubles:
Swinnen/ Spencer (UO) def Nyman/Roshan (BYU) 8-5
Bieri/Kost (UO) def. Hand/Kokurin (BYU) 8-2
King/Pickard (UO) def. Bradshaw/Kaufhold (BYU) 8-4
Singles:
Ivan Kokurin (BYU) def. Aaron Spencer (UO) 7-6, 6-3
Chip Hand (BYU) def. Marcus Schiller (UO) 7-6, 4-6, 6-3
Thomas Bieri (UO) def. Richard Dasek (BYU) 6-1, 6-1
Manuel Kost (UO) def. Nima Roshan (BYU) 6-3, 6-4
Sven Swinnen (UO) def. Erik Nyman (BYU) 6-4, 7-5
Chris King (UO) def. Alonzo Medina (BYU) 6-4, 7-6
PROVO -- The BYU men's tennis team (No. 61) prepares for a three-day road trip to take on Oregon (No. 60), Louisiana-Lafayette (No. 75) and the University of Washington (No. 11) Thursday through Saturday. The Cougars are 1-1 on the season.
Coming off a big win over Utah State and a tough match against Denver, BYU head coach Brad Pearce looks forward to another tough week.
"I am very excited about this week," Pearce said. "I really feel like our guys are ready to take on these three teams. They gained a lot of confidence from last week's match [against Denver]. This will be a good trip for us."
The University of Oregon Ducks will host the two-day dual match against the Cougars and Louisiana-Lafayette Thursday and Friday. Following the match, BYU will head North to it's match against Washington.
The Ducks are coming off a season-opener win over the Broncos of Santa Clara posting their first win of the season. Adding to Oregon's win was strong doubles play and four singles wins.
The University of Louisiana-Lafayette fell to second ranked Baylor Bears in its first match of the season 6-1. BYU's senior Erik Nyman (No. 80) will face No. 88 ranked Evghenii Corduneanu of Louisiana-Lafayette to battle in the singles match-up on Friday.
The highest ranked opponent the Cougars will face this season, the Washington huskies (No. 11), swept Santa Clara in its season opener last weekend. Junior Alex Vlaski, of Belgrade, Yugoslavia is currently ranked second in the nation in singles play. The Yugoslav led the Huskies in singles and doubles action against Santa Clara.
This week's matches are only three of 16 total road matches the Cougars will see this season.
