Men's Tennis Falls Against Two Nationally Ranked Teams

Friday, February 13

Logan, Utah

11:00 am

University of Northern Colorado

Utah State

Photo by: Ed Navarro

2/15/2015 10:18:00 AM | Men's Tennis

UNC's men's tennis team took on two nationally ranked teams in Utah State and Utah this weekend falling in both matchups

By: Ryan Pfeifer, UNCBears.com

SALT LAKE CITY, Utah—Northern Colorado men's tennis faced some tough competition this weekend competing against #73 Utah State on Friday and #54 Utah on Saturday. The Bears dropped both duels falling to Utah State 6-1 and Utah 7-0. The results from the weekend bring the teams overall record to 2-4 for the year.

In the match against Utah State, UNC got out to a good start winning the doubles point behind the pairs of Ben Gendron (Flower Mound, Texas)-Austin Mayo (Austin, Texas) and Cassell King (Henderson, Nev.) - Jordan Loughnan (Mudgee, South Wales). Gendron/Mayo won the number one doubles by the score of 7-5, and King/Loughan winning 6-4 in the number two doubles.

In singles play, Northern Colorado competed well, but was unable to take a match. Gendron pushed Jack Swindells of the Aggies to all three sets falling 3-6, 6-1, 1-6. King also played well in the number six singles falling 2-6, 5-7.

"It was the team's first match against a nationally ranked opponent and they (Utah State) have been going through all the Big Sky teams handily," head coach Mike Phillips said. "Winning the doubles was a great result and we competed well in singles with opportunities. It is a loss that we can learn some things we need to work on, but also build confidence that we can play at a higher level."

On Saturday Utah had a clean sweep of the Bears. The Utes are the highest ranked team UNC has every played in the school history. Even with the sweep, Mitchel Knight (Tulsa, Okla.) battled hard in his singles match falling 3-6, 4-6.

"It is good to play a strong schedule," Phillips said, "but a rough loss today. Hopefully we learn from it for the important Big Sky matchups coming up."

The Bears return to action next weekend with two Big Sky matches and a non-conference match. The weekend starts with a conference match on Friday at Eastern Washington, and is followed up with a double header Saturday against Lewis-Clark State College in the morning and Idaho in the afternoon. Both of Saturday's matches will take place in Lewiston, Idaho.