BATON ROUGE- The 55th-ranked LSU men’s tennis team bounced back from the brink of match point to upset 21st-ranked Wake Forest, 4-3, on Friday night in W.T. “Dub” Robinson Stadium.
Although LSU lost the early lead after Wake Forest captured the doubles point, LSU duo Sebastian Carlsson and Mark Bowtell notched a decisive 8-1 victory over Danny Kreyman and Zach Leslie.
In singles, five LSU players dropped the first set to Wake Forest opponents, leaving the team in a fight to rebound, and rebound it did.
Bowtell was the first off the courts with a victory for the Tigers after a straight-set win 7-6 (13-11), 7-5 over No. 97 Iain Atkinson. The decision put LSU on the board and gave Bowtell his third-straight victory.
No. 46 Neal Skupski gave LSU its second singles victory after defeating his third-straight nationally-ranked opponent on the top court. Skupski won a three-set standoff after fighting a 5-3 second-set deficit to No. 29 Tripper Carleton that would have ended the match for the Tigers. The 6-1 sophomore rallied to a final mark of 2-6, 7-5, 6-1 and kept LSU in the match, 2-3.
LSU’s Julien Gauthier and James Turbervill held on to a 5-4 third-set mark on court five and six, respectively, with the match hanging in the balance.
Turbervill was the first to power through, and put the Tigers in a position to win when he defeated Jason Morgenstern, 1-6, 6-4, 6-4.
Gauthier dealt the final blow and clinched the upset of the Demon Deacons after pulling through in the third set with a 6-4 mark to overcome Leslie, 3-6, 7-5, 6-4.
The loss to LSU is the first for the Demon Deacons outside a top-15 team.
“It was a great character win by our team today from the low of having a match point, and not getting the doubles point, they responded with tremendous fight,” LSU head coach Jeff Brown said. “We showed that we did learn the lessons, and I think they are ingrained in us from last week that when you continue to fight good things can happen.”
The win improves LSU’s record 5-7 on the season with a conference match on the horizon.
LSU travels to Knoxville, Tenn. for its next match against second-ranked SEC opponent Tennessee in a 1 p.m. CST match at the Varsity Tennis Courts. The Tigers will return home for a matchup with No. 4 Ohio State on March 23 at 2 p.m. with free admittance.
#55 LSU 4, #21 Wake Forest 3
March 19, 2010
W.T. “Dub” Robinson Stadium
Baton Rouge, La.
Singles
1. #46 Neal Skupski (LSU) def. #29 Tripper Carleton (WF), 2-6, 7-5, 6-1
2. #56 Steven Forman (WF) def. Sebastian Carlsson (LSU), 7-6 (7-4), 6-1
3. Jonathan Wolff (WF) def. Stefan Szacinski (LSU), 7-5, 7-6 (7-4)
4. Mark Bowtell (LSU) def. #97 Iain Atkinson (WF), 7-6 (13-11), 7-5
5. Julien Gauthier (LSU) def. Zach Leslie (WF), 3-6, 7-5, 6-4
6. James Turbervill (LSU) def. Jason Morgenstern (WF), 1-6, 6-4, 6-4
Doubles
1. #16 Atkinson/Forman (WF) def. Anderson/Skupski (LSU), 8-4
2. Carlsson/Bowtell (LSU) def. Kreyman/Leslie (WF), 8-1
3. Wolf/Carleton (WF) def. Szacinski/Borsos (LSU), 9-8 (7-5)
Order of finish: Doubles (2,1,3); Singles (2, 4,3, 1, 5, 6 )