March 22, 2013
UNIVERSITY PARK, Pa. - The Penn State men's tennis team fell to Indiana 5-2 on Friday at the Indoor Tennis Center. The Nittany Lions dropped the doubles point, but picked up two singles wins and a doubles win. The Nittany Lions are now 6-9 this spring, 0-2 in the Big Ten. Indiana improved to 9-8 and got their first Big Ten win.
"Unfortunately, we didn't play as well as I thought we would today, especially after an extended break, said Head Coach Jeff Zinn. "I hope that we come out and play more like ourselves against Purdue tomorrow."
Indiana showed off their strong doubles teams. Sam Monette and Isade Juneau, ranked 31st in the nation, defeated Russell Bader (Austin, Texas) and Guanhua Chen (DaLian, China) 8-3 in the first doubles match.
Josh MacTaggart and Daniel Bednarczyk then followed with an 8-4 win over Bryan Welnetz (Laredo, Texas) and C.J. Griffin (Portland, Mich.).
Roman Trkulja (Toronto, Canada) and Chris Young (Melbourne, Australia) paired up for the first time this year in doubles. The duo earned an 8-5 victory against Chris Essick and Dimitrije Tasic.
Junior Russell Bader got Penn State's first point of the day with a 6-1, 6-3 win over Dimitrije Tasic. In the second set, rallied from down 2-0.
Freshman Roman Trkulja also got a win, sweeping Elliott Yee 6-2, 6-1. It was Trkulja's seventh win of the spring.
Bryan Welnetz dropped a 6-3, 7-5 result to Sam Monette. The second set was featured a lot of back-and-forth action, but Monette got the last two games after Welnetz tied it up at 5-5. Monette's win was Indiana's fourth and clinching point of the match.
In the number two singles spot, Indiana's MacTaggart got a 6-1, 6-3 victory over Tomas Hanzlik (Prague, Czech Republic). Hanzlik is now 9-6 this spring.
Junior Chris Young fell 6-3, 6-2 against Isade Juneau. Young dropped to 5-7 with the loss.
Matt Barry (Lido Beach, N.Y.) snapped his eight-match win streak against Daniel Bednarczyk. Barry won the first set 6-4, but Bednarczyk responded by winning the second 6-2. In the third, Bednarczyk got a 10-3 victory.
The Nittany Lions got a season-high 125 in attendance for the match.
"I want to thank the fans for coming out today, we had a great crowd. That's really important to have that support as we get into the Big Ten schedule," said Coach Zinn.
Penn State continues Big Ten play at home on Sunday against #63 Purdue. The match starts at Noon in the Indoor Tennis Center.
Doubles:
1. #31 Monette/Juneau(Ind) def. Bader/Chen(PSU), 8-3
2. MacTaggart/Bednarczyk(Ind) def. Griffin/Welnetz(PSU), 8-4
3. Trkulja/Young(PSU) def. Essick/Tasic(Ind), 8-5
Order of Finish:1,2,3
Singles:
1. Sam Monette(Ind) def. Bryan Welnetz(PSU), 6-3, 7-5
2. Josh MacTaggart(Ind) def. Tomas Hanzlik(PSU), 6-1, 6-3
3. Isade Juneau(Ind) def. Chris Young(PSU), 6-3, 6-2
4. Russell Bader(PSU) def. Dimitrije Tasic(Ind), 6-1, 6-3
5. Daniel Bednarczyk(Ind) def. Matt Barry(PSU), 4-6, 6-2, 10-3
6. Roman Trkulja(PSU) def. Elliott Yee(Ind), 6-2, 6-1
Order of Finish: 3,2,1,4,6,5