The UVA men’s tennis team (14-13) had its season come to an end with a 4-2 loss to No. 16 Columbia (19-4) on Saturday (May 12) in the second round of the 2018 NCAA Men’s Tennis Championship.
Columbia won the doubles point and picked up a win on court five to take a 2-0 lead. The Cavaliers tied the match with wins by sophomore Carl Söderlund (Stockholm, Sweden) and Aswin Lizen (Douglas, Isle of Man) on courts one and two, but Columbia regained the advantage with a victory on court three and finished things off with a three-set victory on court six.
The match was slated to start at 12 p.m., but due to rain, was pushed back to a 4 p.m. start at the Billie Jean King National Tennis Center. The two teams played the first 1:44 minutes of the match in Flushing, N.Y., making it through the doubles point and the full first set in five of the six singles matches before it began raining again and the match was put into a delay. The competition was then relocated to the indoor courts at Dick Savitt Tennis Center on Columbia’s campus in Upper Manhattan, with play resuming two hours after the initial delay.
“Credit to Columbia, I thought they played better in big moments,” said head coach Andres Pedroso. “They played better in deuce points, for sure. I felt that Columbia was a little better than us today in doubles and in some spots in singles. My guys fought hard, like they have fought all year.”
In doubles, Columbia picked up 6-2 victories on courts one and three to win the point.
In singles, Lizen picked up the first point for the Cavaliers, closing out a 6-2, 6-3 victory over No. 63 Jackie Tang. Söderlund, who dominated his first set, 6-1, battled to a 6-6 tie in the second set against No. 27 Victor Pham. Söderlund won the tiebreaker 7-5 to take the match and give the Cavaliers their second point. Freshman Kyrylo Tsygura (North Potomac, Md.) also preserved in a tiebreaker, 7-3, to win his first set. His match was in the second set when play was abandoned.
Columbia advances to the Wake Forest Tennis Complex in Winston-Salem, North Carolina, where the final 16 teams will compete for the national championship May 18-22. The event will be hosted by Wake Forest University.
Söderlund and Lizen will be competing in the NCAA Singles Championship, starting May 23 in Winston-Salem.
#16 Columbia 4, Virginia 2
Singles competition
1. #24 Carl Soderlund (VA) def. #27 Victor Pham (COL) 6-1, 7-6 (5)
2. #51 Aswin Lizen (VA) def. #62 Jackie Tang (COL) 6-2, 6-3
3. Jack Lin (COL) def. Gianni Ross (VA) 6-4, 6-1
4. Kyrylo Tsygura (VA) vs. Adam Ambrozy (COL) 7-6 (3), 3-5, unfinished
5. Austen Huang (COL) def. Matthew Lord (VA) 6-4, 6-1
6. Timothy Wang (COL) def. Ammar Alhaqbani (VA) 6-3, 4-6, 6-1
Doubles competition
1. #41 Victor Pham/Jackie Tang def. #67 Matthew Lord/Carl Soderlund (VA) 6-2
2. #45 Gianni Ross/Aswin Lizen (VA) vs. #43 Jack Lin/William Matheson, 4-3 unfinished
3. Adam Ambrozy/Michal Rolski def Ammar Alhaqbani/Spencer Bozsik (VA) 6-2
Order of finish: Doubles (1,3); Singles (5,2,1,3,6)
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Chris Graham
