Georgia men beat MSU in tennis
ATHENS, GA – The 41st-ranked Mississippi State men’s tennis team fell in a tight 5-2 affair to No. 10 Georgia in an afternoon affair at the Dan Magill Tennis Complex Sunday.
State (9-6, 1-2 SEC) fell to Georgia (9-2, 2-1 SEC) for the first time since 2017 in Southeastern Conference play, the Bulldogs having taken the last two meetings between the teams in conference action prior to Sunday’s matchup.
“Today was a great college tennis match,” MSU head coach Matt Roberts said. “We competed at a very high level and took one step in the right direction. Our team is learning how to compete and problem solve. We gave ourselves very good opportunities to beat a top 10 team on the road. We will build off of this. The boys are ready to train hard this week for three home matches this weekend.”
In doubles action to open the match, Bulldogs Giovanni Oradini and Stedman Strickland dropped a close 6-4 affair to Georgia’s No. 26 Blake Croyder and Phillip Henning at the No. 2 position. Finishing next wase the No. 15 Georgia duo of Trent Bryde and Tyler Zink as they defeated the 43rd-ranked MSU pair of Florian Broska and Nicolas Ocana 7-5 at No. 1 in another tight battle. At the time of the clinch, the No. 75 State duo of Alberto Colas and Gregor Ramskogler trailed 2-1 in a tiebreaker to Erik Grevelius and Robert Loeb on court 3.
In singles play, MSU came out strong by claiming four first sets to try and rally for the win, and they came very close to doing just that. The first three matches ended in straight sets, with State claiming two of those to knot the match at 2-2. Court 3 would finish first with Georgia’s No. 88 Croyder defeating Ramskogler 6-1, 6-2.
State then notched straight-set victories at the No. 5 and 6 positions. The MSU true freshman Colas continued his successful weekend by defeating Georgia’s Baptiste Anselmo 7-6(4), 6-0 on court 5. Following him was fellow true freshman Isaac Becroft at No. 6, where he bested Georgia’s Loeb 6-4, 7-5 to tie the match.
The final three matches would all go to a third set to decide the match.