ORLANDO, Fla. – The No. 13 UCF men's tennis team won its seventh straight match, beating No. 25 Tulane 5-2 on Sunday afternoon. All seven victories have been over ranked opponents.
"It was a hard fought match today, the doubles point ended up being pretty important," said Director of Tennis John Roddick. "Proud of our guys for fighting in some third sets there. Some of the guys did a great job closing out today. We're having different guys come through for us, these are team wins now at this point. Every guy is contributing in these big wins throughout these last two weeks. I'm proud of the effort."
The Green Wave started the afternoon with a win on doubles court three as Fynn Kuenkler and Luis Erlenbusch beat Alan Rubio and Kento Yamada 6-2. No. 29 Trey Hilderbrand and Bogdan Pavel remained perfect this season with a 6-2 win on court one, beating No. 45 Hamish Stewart and Ewan More. Hilderbrand and Pavel are 5-0 since joining back up at the No. 1 spot with four of their wins over ranked opponents. The Black and Gold clinched the doubles point on court two where Gabriel Decamps and Juan Pablo Grassi Mazzuchi bested Akos Kotorman and Billy Suarez 6-3.
Singles was gritty from the beginning but saw the Knights take four of six first sets. Tulane was the one to strike first though as Erlenbusch defeated No. 124 Grassi Mazzuchi 6-2, 6-3 to even the match at 1-1.
It was nearly all Knights the rest of the way. UCF earned its first singles point on court four as Yamada triumphed over Kuenkler 6-2, 6-4 to move to 13-1 this season.
Hilderbrand was next to win his match, edging Suarez 7-5, 7-6 (8-6) on court five. Hilderbrand has won six straight matches now and is 13-4 overall this season.
Rubio clinched the match for the Knights as he earned a 3-6, 6-1, 6-4 victory on court two over Moore, snapping a brief two match skid. Play continued following the deciding court.
No. 4 Decamps got back to his winning ways after his 13-match winning streak was snapped due to his retirement against South Florida on Saturday. He earned yet another win over a ranked opponent, beating No. 29 Stewart 6-3, 3-6, 7-6 (7-0) after being down 2-5 in the final frame. Decamps advances to 16-2 this season and is 8-2 against ranked opposition.
The final match of the day went the way of Tulane as Rafael de Alba beat Mikhail Sokolovskiy 2-6, 6-4, 6-3 on court six.
The Knights are winners of seven straight and 12 of their last 13 matches. UCF is one victory away from tying their winning streak of eight from last season. Another victory would also tie the mark for most wins in a campaign during the Roddick era at UCF. The Black and Gold haven't had a season with more than 16 wins since 2003 when they went 20-4 and were crowned champions of the ASUN, earning the first conference title in program history.
In total, UCF has faced eight straight ranked opponents and 11 straight when including teams that were receiving votes. The Black and Gold have just four matches remaining in the regular season; three of the four are currently ranked in the Oracle/ITA top 50.
The Black and Gold move to 4-0 this season against conference opponents. They haven't lost to a team from the American Athletic Conference in almost two calendar years.
UP NEXT
The Knights will have the week off from match action and return to the courts on Sunday as they host North Florida. This will be the second time this season that the two sides meet; UCF got the best of the Ospreys in their last meeting, sweeping them 7-0 in Jacksonville on Feb. 20.
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