The No. 29 LSU men’s tennis team had two looming questions to be answered heading into this weekend’s ITA Kickoff Weekend in Tallahassee, Fla. The first was if the top of the singles lineup could handle the challenge of playing against the top players in the country, with the second directed toward the play of LSU’s three freshmen. Neither mattered as the Tigers (0-2) dropped two decisions during the weekend – a 4-2 defeat Friday against No. 19 Louisville and a 4-2 loss Saturday to host and No. 13 Florida State. ‘We played well in spots, and we played like a very young team in spots,’ LSU men’s coach Jeff Brown said in a news release. ‘I thought we did good considering we are down [junior] Julien Gauthier at the moment, and the team shows a lot of promise.’ Gauthier did not make the trip to Florida after suffering a left ankle injury in practice earlier in the week. His injury made room for several young Tigers to crack the lineup. Freshman Stefan Szacinski made the most of the weekend with a straight-set, 6-1, 7-5, victory against Florida State’s Andres Bucaro. ‘ Szacinski also held a 7-5, 4-2 lead on Friday against Alejandro Calligari, but the match was suspended when No. 46 Austen Childs clinched the victory for Florida State with a 6-4, 7-5 victory against LSU junior Sebastian Carlsson. LSU sophomore Neal Skupski, who was bumped from his usual No. 1 singles spot down to No. 2, struggled in his two matches. Skupski, the No. 26 singles player in the country, dropped a straight-set decision Friday to No. 84 Simon Childs, 6-3, 6-4, and lost in three sets to No. 111 Vahid Mirzadeh, 6-1, 5-7, 6-1. After the loss Louisville on Friday, LSU regrouped with a strong showing against the Seminoles on Saturday.
The Tigers fell behind early as they lost the doubles point, but stormed back with singles victories from Szacinski and freshman James Turbervill to narrow the margin to 3-2.
The upset bid came up short when No. 27 Jean-Yves Aubone edged Carlsson in three sets, 4-6, 6-4, 6-1, to clinch the match for Florida State. LSU returns to action Friday at No. 34 Rice.
Meanwhile, the No. 28 LSU women’s tennis team had a similar fate in the women’s portion of the ITA Kickoff Weekend in Los Angeles. The Lady Tigers (2-2) dropped both of their matches during the weekend as Southeastern Conference rival Auburn blanked their counterpart Friday, 4-0, and San Diego cruised to a
4-1 victory Saturday in a consolation match. LSU looked overmatched for most of the match against Auburn, but returned Saturday against San Diego with hopes of leaving California with a lasting impression. The Lady Tigers got off to a strong start in doubles when sophomore Whitney Wolf and freshman Keri Frankenberger blew past Juliette Coupez and Alexandra Demidova, 8-2, but dropped the next two doubles matches as San Diego won the doubles point. Freshman Kaitlin Burns evened the score at 1-1 after a 6-1, 6-2 victory against Demidova. But the Lady Toreros answered with back-to-back singles victories and clinched the match as Coupez barely got by No. 120 Wolf, 6-3, 2-6, 7-5. ‘We fought extremely hard in singles, but I don’t think we came to play in doubles,’ LSU women’s coach Tony Minnis said in a news release. ‘It was a tough loss for us. We had opportunities, but we need to capitalize in the future.’
LSU returns home Sunday to host Texas A&M at W.T. ‘Dub’ Robinson Stadium.
Contact Sean Isabella at [email protected] ‘