TCU
Mississippi
Frogs Fall to Ole Miss in NCAA First Round
5/15/2010 12:00:00 AM | Men's Tennis
May 15, 2010
COLLEGE STATION, Texas—TCU suffered a 4-1 loss to No. 18 Ole Miss in the first round of the NCAA Men's Tennis Championships Saturday at Texas A&M's George P. Mitchell Tennis Center.
The Horned Frogs, who entered the weekend as the region's No. 3 seed, concluded their season with a 12-13 overall record. Second-seeded Ole Miss will advance to face No. 1 seed Texas A&M Saturday for the right to move on to the NCAA Championships in Athens, Ga.
Friday's match, which was scheduled to start at 3 p.m., was plagued by six hours of weather delays due to heavy rain in the College Station area. After finally beginning at 9 p.m., the two teams did not wrap up play until just before 1 a.m.
TCU dropped the doubles point and quickly found itself trailing by a 3-0 margin after Rebel victories by 97th-ranked Tucker Vorster at No. 2 singles over Frog sophomore Slah Mbarek (6-2, 6-3) and Chris Thiemann at No. 4 over freshman Marius Cirstea (7-5, 6-3). Mbarek was making his first appearance in the TCU singles lineup since suffering an injury back on April 10.
Junior Zach Nichols helped put the Frogs on the board at No. 3 singles with a stirring 6-3, 6-7 (4), 7-5 win over Jonas Lutjen. The victory helped breathe life into TCU. Frogs found themselves in the thick of things in each of the final three singles matches, but decisions at the Nos. 5 and 6 positions went unfinished with the Frogs' Christopher Price and Paul Chappell leading their matches.
Ole Miss sophomore Marcel Thiemann, ranked 33rd nationally, closed out the match at the top spot with a 6-7 (4), 7-6 (3), 6-2 win over junior Emanuel Brighiu, snapping the Frog's three-match individual winning streak.
TCU started out quick in doubles, with Chappell and Nichols rallying for an 8-5 victory at the No. 3 position to put the Frogs up one match early in the race for the point. The Frog pairing trailed 5-3 before taking the final five games.
Ole Miss responded by taking the other two matches to claim the team point. Lutjen and Vorster, ranked 61st nationally, breezed past Mbarek and junior Cameron Nash at the No. 2 spot, 8-1, while the Rebels' Thiemann brothers, ranked 20th, posted an 8-4 win at the top position over TCU's 42nd-rated Brighiu and Price in a battle of NCAA doubles qualifiers. The loss for Brighiu and Price snapped a nine-match winning streak that dated back to April 4.
"The doubles was the key to the match," head coach Dave Borelli said. "I thought if we would have won the doubles point, we would have been right there all the way to the end. We had great chances to win the matches at Nos. 5 and 6 that went unfinished. (Brighiu) played a great opponent at No. 1. He let go of a few chances there at the end of the match, but Thiemann is a good player.
"Ole Miss is a top-20 team, and I thought we hung right in there with them. This is the kind of tennis I thought we should be playing all season long. If we had been playing at this level throughout the year, it would have helped in a match like this. We're close to playing at the level we need to be playing. I certainly think we can be better. The key is how we work this summer. The guys need to work hard on their development in the offseason, play a lot of tournaments. Our last two or three weeks of tennis this season was top-30 level, but we need to work on building on that momentum for next season."
With the dual-match portion of TCU's season schedule now at an end, the Frogs turn their attention to the individual national championships. Brighiu and Price will represent the team in NCAA Doubles May 26-31 in Athens, Ga. The duo gives TCU an entry at the individual championships for the 31st time in the last 35 years.
RESULTS
#18 Ole Miss 4, #51 TCU 1
May 14, 2010
College Station, Texas (George P. Mitchell Tennis Center)
SINGLES
1. *#33 Marcel Thiemann (Miss) def. Emanuel Brighiu (TCU), 6-7 (4), 7-6 (3), 6-2
2. #97 Tucker Vorster (Miss) def. Slah Mbarek (TCU), 6-2, 6-3
3. Zach Nichols (TCU) def. Jonas Lutjen (Miss), 6-3, 6-7 (4), 7-5
4. Chris Thiemann (Miss) def. Marius Cirstea (TCU), 7-5, 6-3
5. Chris Price (TCU) led Adrian Forberg Skogeng (Miss), 7-6 (4), 2-2, unf.
6. Paul Chappell (TCU) led Harry Fowler (Miss) 4-6, 6-3, 1-1, unf.
DOUBLES
1. #20 C. Thiemann/M. Thiemann (Miss) def. #42 E. Brighiu/C. Price (TCU), 8-4
2. #61 J. Lutjen/T. Vorster (Miss) def. S. Mbarek/C. Nash (TCU), 8-1
3. P. Chappell/Z. Nichols (TCU) def. A. Forberg Skogeng/H. Fowler (Miss), 8-5
ORDER OF FINISH
Singles: 2,4,3,1*
Doubles: 3,2,1
Players Mentioned
