The No. 20 LSU men’s tennis team fell 1-4 to the No. 11 Mississippi State Bulldogs on Wednesday in a rematch of a Jan. 26 shutout loss.
LSU went into the match confidently after its dramatic 4-3 win against No. 6 Tennessee last Sunday. The confidence did nothing for the Tigers during the doubles portion of the match, as the Bulldogs raced out to leads on all three courts.
“It wasn’t our best day from a tennis standpoint,” said coach Jeff Brown. “We really struggled with doubles to find our form.”
All matches remained competitive throughout, with no match being decided by more than two points. LSU seniors Roger Anderson and Olivier Borsos’ match was abandoned while they were down 6-7, as Mississippi State had already clinched the point.
The singles point was similarly tight, as four of the six matches went into first set tiebreakers. The match swung permanently in the Bulldogs’ direction as they came away with three of those four sets.
“It was a little unfortunate that we lost three out of four tiebreakers and ultimately that was the difference,” Brown said. “If we had gotten three out of four of those, then things could have been a little different. It still would have been tough, but ultimately the tiebreakers in singles was the difference.”
Senior Stefan Szacinski was the only Tiger to come away with a victory on the day, marking his eighth straight singles victory.
After pulling off a major upset against the No. 4 player in the country Saturday, sophomore Chris Simpson couldn’t pull off another stunner, as he was trailing to No. 12 Romain Bogaerts when the match was abandoned.
The Tigers have only managed to win consecutive Southeastern Conference games once this season — when they ripped off three straight victories in March — and Brown attributed the stop-start season to the quality of the SEC.
“When you play top-15 teams almost every week, you’re going to struggle unless you’re a top-five team,” Brown said.
According to the ITA college tennis rankings, 11 SEC teams currently reside in the top-25.
The Tigers continue their quest for the postseason Saturday, when they will play a doubleheader against Arkansas and Jackson State.
