Feb. 15, 2008
CORAL GABLES, Fla. (www.ucfathletics.com) - The UCF men's tennis team dropped a 6-1 decision to No. 26 Miami at the Neil Schiff Tennis Center on Friday afternoon. The Knights fell to 2-3 in the 2008 campaign, while the Hurricanes improved to 5-2. The match served as the second top-30 program the Knights have played.
"I knew going into the match that our team was up for the challenge," said UCF head coach Bobby Cashman. "I think Tarek (Ben Soltane) and Johan (Beigart) played exceptionally well at singles and I was glad to see Tarek and Danny (Colon) fight to get the doubles win."
Miami took the first point of the afternoon with back-to-back doubles wins at Nos. 1 and 2. At No. 3, juniors Tarek Ben Soltane (Tunis, Tunisia) and Danny Colon (Jacksonville, Fla./Englewood) took Keith Crowley and Hector Nieto down to the wire, pulling out an 8-7(4) win.
In singles play, Ben Soltane grabbed UCF its lone point of the day, cruising to a 6-0, 6-2 win against Crowley at No. 5. The victory was Ben Soltane's first of the spring season.
Sophomore Johan Beigart (Vaxjo, Sweden) had one of the toughest singles match-ups and was able to take David Rosenfeld, ranked 98th in the nation, to three sets. Beigart rolled over Rosenfeld, 6-2, in the first set, but dropped the second, 6-2. In the third, Beigart battled, but came up short in the supertiebreaker, 10-8.
The Knights have a week off before traveling to Hattiesburg, Miss. for the three-day Conference USA Shootout on Friday, Feb. 22. UCF is 6-0 in the past two tournaments.
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