NEW ORLEANS — The 19th-ranked LSU men’s tennis team fell in the first round of the NCAA Tournament on Saturday as the Tigers were upended by the upstart South Alabama Jaguars, 4-2, at the Goldring Tennis Stadium on the campus of Tulane University.
With the victory, South Alabama improved to 20-7 on the season and extended its winning streak to six-consecutive matches. The 4-2 win advanced the Jaguars to the round of 32 where they will face off against the homestanding Tulane Green Wave on Sunday at noon. The 15th-ranked Green Wave cruised past Southern, 4-0, in the opening match on Saturday.
“I think that the three-week layoff from our previous match really effected us today and we seemed a little rusty,” said LSU head coach Jeff Brown. “We tried to play matches in practice, but you never really get the same intensity that you do in a competitive contest. South Alabama is a better team right now than they were throughout the regular season and they just outplayed us today.”
South Alabama led the NCAA first-round contest by an overall score of 3-2 on Saturday when the Jaguars’ Clinton Jacobs earned a crucial 6-4, 6-4, match-clinching victory on court No. 2. After trailing 3-0 in the second set, Jacobs rallied past LSU’s Jason Hazley to earn the straight-set victory. The win improved the Jaguars’ sophomore to a 24-8 overall record on the season.
With the loss, LSU concluded its 2003 dual-match season with a 13-11 overall record and suffered its first defeat against South Alabama in school history.
Prior to Saturday’s matchup, the Tigers held a 7-0 advantage in the all-time series against South Alabama. The Jaguars, who recently won their fifth straight Sun Belt championship, improved its all-time record against Southeastern Conference rivals to 3-6 in NCAA Tournament play. The Jaguars’ previous postseason wins against SEC opponents came against Auburn in 1994 and Kentucky in 2001.
South Alabama jumped out to an early 2-0 lead on Saturday as the Jaguars won the doubles point and picked up a prompt victory in the No. 1 singles match.
“We were really rusty during doubles play,” Brown said. “They jumped on us early and we could never really rebound in the singles competition. I think that we fought hard today and I’m proud of our team. We’re disappointed right now, but we’re extremely optimistic about the future. We have everybody returning next season and we should be a top-10 team in the preseason rankings.”
After tallying the opening point of the match by winning two of the three doubles contests, South Alabama’s 91st-ranked Heinrich Heyl dropped the Tigers’ 62nd-ranked Peter Richman, 6-3, 6-2, on court No. 1. With the win, Heyl extended the Jaguars’ lead in the match to 2-0 and upped his overall record on the season to 15-9 on the season.
LSU evened the overall score of the match at 2-2 as juniors Bryan Fisher and Cory Ross recorded straight-set victories on courts Nos. 3 and 5, respectively.
Fisher, the Tigers’ powerful native of Nashville, Tenn., defeated South Alabama’s Aurelio Di Zazzo, 6-2, 6-3, in the No. 3 singles match, while Ross knocked off the Jaguars’ Jorgen Vestli by an identical 6-2, 6-3 score on court No. 5. With the win, Ross upped his team-leading singles record to 24-11 on the season.
South Alabama picked up its third point of the afternoon on court No. 6 as the Jaguars’ David Nylen defeated LSU’s Paul White in straight sets, 6-4, 6-4. Nylen, a native of Orebro, Sweden, improved his overall record on the season to 15-11.
South Alabama (20-7) def. #19 LSU (13-11), 4-2
Doubles
1. #34 Heyl/Jacobs (USA) def. #18 Fisher/Hazley (LSU), 8-6*
2. Ross/Rutka (LSU) vs. DiZazzo/Fowler (USA), DNF: LSU led 7-5
3. Mazaev/Vestli (USA) def. Brandon Nicholson/Richman (LSU), 8-4
Singles
1. #91 Heinrich Heyl (USA) def. #62 Peter Richman (LSU), 6-3, 6-2
2. Clinton Jacobs (USA) def. Jason Hazley (LSU), 6-4, 6-4**
3. Bryan Fisher (LSU) def. Aurelio Di Zazzo (USA), 6-2, 6-3
4. Sebastian Rutka (LSU) vs. Pavel Mazaev (USA), DNF: USA led 6-0, 3-5
5. #117 Cory Ross (LSU) def. Jorgen Vestli (USA), 6-2, 6-3
6. David Nylen (USA) def. Paul White (LSU), 6-4, 6-4
* Clinched the doubles point
** Clinched the match