Utah Tennis Falls to SMU to Start Road Trip

Dallas – The University of Utah men's tennis dropped a road match on Friday, coming short on the first of three weekend matches in Dallas. After SMU won the doubles point, the Utes fell behind in singles matches for an overall score of 5-2 at the SMU Tennis Complex.

The match started off with a win from SMU for the doubles point. The first finish came at the No. 2 position, where Utah's Francisco Bastias and Randy Cory fell short against the No. 2 SMU duo, 6-3. In the third court, Slava Shainyan and Mathias Gavelin dropped a close one to their respective opponents, 6-4 to see SMU take the 1-0 lead in the match. The match at the No. 1 position did not finish as the teams moved to singles.

SMU took a quick 3-0 lead in the match to make Utah need the remaining singles wins to have a shot at the match. The match at the No. 4 position was SMU's second point of the day, with SMU's Vaise defeating Bastias 6-2, 6-3. Trailing right behind were SMU's Wilson and Utah's Bruno Krenn, where SMU also took the upper hand finishing the match 6-2, 6-2.

Franco Capalbo gave the Utes their first point of the day, coming victorious against SMU's Krall in a dominant 6-2,6-2 victory. Shainyan, Geronimo Espin Busleiman and Gavelin and played tight matches at the remaining courts to give the Utes hope at the No. 1, No. 3 and No. 5 positions, but the Utes ultimately fell short to SMU.

Gavelin dropped his match after forcing a third set with his 6-1 second set win, but went on to come up short in the third set 7-5 to have SMU clinch the win. Busleiman was forced to a third set as well, but with the match clinched, Busleiman and SMU's Vrbsky played a tiebreaker. Busleiman went on the drop the tiebreaker and match.

The last finish and the Utes' second point came from the No. 1 position's close match, where Utah's Shainyan defeated SMU's Chakravarthi in a marathon match. Shainyan dropped the first set 3-6, but bounced back with a 6-4 win in the second. Shainyan then pulled out the 7-6 (3) win in the third to close out Friday's play.

The Utah men's tennis team will play second of three matches in Dallas on Saturday, Jan. 23 against UT Arlington at 2 p.m. MT.
 
SMU 5, Utah 2
Doubles (2,3)
1. Vaise / Bianchi (SMU) vs. Franco Capalbo/Geronimo Espin Busleiman (UU), 5-4, dnf.
2. Krall/ Steinhausen (SMU) def. Francisco Bastias/Randy Cory (UU), 6-3
3. Chakravarthi/Allen (SMU) def. Slava Shainyan/Mathias Gavelin (UU), 6-4
 
Singles (4,6,2,5,3,1)
1. Slava Shainyan (UU) def. Caleb Chakravarthi (SMU), 3-6, 6-4, 7-6 (3)
2. Franco Capalbo (UU) def. Liam Krall (SMU), 6-2, 6-2
3. Jan-Simon Vrbsky (SMU) def. Geronimo Espin Busleiman (UU), 7-6 (3), 5-7, 2-10
4. Tomas Vaise (SMU) def. Francisco Bastias (UU), 6-2, 6-3
5. Julian Steinhausen (SMU) def. Mathias Gavelin (UU), 3-6, 6-1, 7-5
6. Clarke Wilson (SMU) def. Bruno Krenn (UU), 6-2, 6-2