FRIDAY: AUBURN 4, OLE MISS 2
After over six hours of match play, which included an hour rain delay, the Ole Miss men’s tennis team fought back, but ultimately lost their Southeastern Conference opener against Auburn 4-2.
The Rebels started their match against Auburn outdoors at the Palmer/Salloum Tennis Center, where they dropped the doubles point and trailed Auburn 1-0 to start. Auburn won 8-5 at doubles at No. 1 and 8-6 at No. 2. Soon after doubles play ended, the rain started to roll in, which caused a half hour delay in play. A decision was made after the delay to move the match indoors to the Gillom Sports Center.
“It’s part of the game. You have to be able to adjust to it,” head coach Billy Chadwick said about the delay and the changing of the court. “There were a couple of positions that playing indoors was a big advantage for them. We knew that if we had to move indoors.”
Once the match moved indoors, Auburn was able to continue its momentum winning two of the first three singles matches. Daniel Cochran of Auburn defeated sophomore Stefan Lindmark 6-3, 6-1, and Dennis Lengsfeld of Auburn defeated junior William Kallberg 7-5, 6-4. Junior Nik Scholtz won his singles match against Lukas Ollert 6-0, 7-6.
The Rebels needed to win the last three singles matches to clinch the victory. Senior Johan Backstrom was able to win his match 6-4, 2-6, 6-2 against Joseph Van Dooren. The Rebels had a fighting chance with freshmen Ricardo Jorge and Vinod Gowda on the court, but ultimately lost the match when Jorge lost to Dante Saleh, who came back and won the match 2-6, 6-4, 6-3.
“It was your typical SEC match. Very similar to the match we had with them last year. The difference was that we won it,” Chadwick said. “The effort from the guys was really good. Auburn really played well down the stretch, especially to win the last match against Ricardo.”
SUNDAY: ALABAMA 4, OLE MISS 2
There was no marathon match for the Rebels this time, but the same result as they fell to 0-2 in the SEC, as they lost to Alabama 4-2.
Doubles play continued to dig the Rebels into a 1-0 hole to start their matches. Junior Nik Scholtz and freshman Ricardo Jorge won their doubles match 8-3 at No. 2. However, junior William Kallberg and sophomore Joe Rogers lost their match 4-8 at No. 3, and senior Johan Backstrom and sophomore Stefan Lindmark lost their match 6-8 at No. 1.
A bright spot for the Rebels this match was the play of Kallberg, who fought back from a set down and won his match against Becker O’Shaughnessey of Alabama 2-6, 6-2, 6-3 at No. 2 singles. Another bright spot was Jorge, who won his match 7-6 (7-3), 7-6 (7-1) at No. 5. The Rebels could not pull through in the end as losses by Lindmark, Backstrom and freshman Vinod Gowda at singles ultimately gave the win to Alabama. Scholtz was on serve in the third set of his match at No. 1 singles. The Rebels needed to get off to a good start in SEC play, but played two quality teams and just could not get the job done.
“We got some tough road matches coming up, but every single SEC match is going to be like you see,” head coach Billy Chadwick said. “You see it all across the league. They’re all 4-3, back and forth back and forth. The guys know that they’re a little shy from the mark, and if they work hard and pick it up, they’ll see good things.”
For continuing coverage of Ole Miss men’s tennis, follow @drubino11 and @thedm_sports on Twitter.
— Dylan Rubino
djrubino@go.olemiss.edu
