BATON ROUGE, La. – The No. 44 LSU Men’s Tennis team (16-13) fell to No. 4 Kentucky (23-2) by a score of 4-0 in Saturday’s match in the semifinals of the SEC Tournament hosted at the LSU Tennis Complex.
Danny’s Thoughts
“Doubles was a huge point for us today,” said head coach Danny Bryan. “With the strength of Kentucky’s team, it was a very important point. If we would’ve won the doubles, we could’ve had a better path to get four points with the singles. They made it really tough on us being such a solid team. A lot of credit has to go to them.”
Doubles
On the No. 2 court, Ben Koch and Stefan Latinovic fell to Taha Baadi and Jack Loutit by a score of 6-2.
The Wildcats clinched the doubles point on the No. 1 court after the No. 7 duo of JJ Mercer and Joshua Lapadat defeated the No. 59 duo of Chen Dong and Julien Penzlin by a score of 6-3.
Singles
On the No. 2 court, Kentucky created a 2-0 lead after No. 97 Lapadat defeated Alessio Vasquez by a score of 6-3, 6-1.
No. 35 Baadi defeated Latinovic on the No. 1 court by a narrow score of 7-5 in the first set and a score of 6-2 in the second set, leaving Kentucky with one more needed point to clinch the match.
Charlelie Cosnet clinched the match 4-0 for the Wildcats after defeating Julien Penzlin by a score of 6-3, 6-4.
Concluding Notes
The last time LSU appeared in the semifinals of the SEC Tournament was in 2007. At the time, current head coach Danny Bryan was a senior on the team and leading the Tigers in singles wins.
“For me, it was more for the guys than myself,” said Bryan. “I really felt like they were doing a lot of things right and they weren’t getting rewarded. We had a lot of long bus rides home that weren’t so much fun and the guys never checked out.”
LSU is now the lowest seed to make it to the semifinals of the tournament. Previously, it was Mississippi State who appeared in the 2006 SEC Semifinals as the No. 12 seed.
Up Next
The Tigers will find out their NCAA Tournament path when the 2024 NCAA Men’s Tennis Tournament selection show airs on NCAA.com at 5 p.m. CT on Monday, April 29.
Results
#4 Kentucky 4, #44 LSU 0
Singles
- #35 Taha Baadi (UK) def. Stefan Latinovic (LSU) 7-5, 6-2
- #97 Joshua Lapadat (UK) def. Alessio Vasquez (LSU) 6-3, 6-1
- Rudy Ceccon (LSU) vs. Jaden Weekes (UK) 6-4, 6-6, unfinished
- Charlelie Cosnet (UK) def. Julien Penzlin (LSU) 6-3, 6-4
- Chen Dong (LSU) vs. Jack Loutit (UK) 6-2, 3-6, 0-1, unfinished
- Welsh Hotard (LSU) vs. Eli Stephenson (UK) 6-1, 5-7, unfinished
Doubles
- #7 JJ Mercer/Joshua Lapadat (UK) def. #59 Chen Dong/Julien Penzlin (LSU) 6-3
- Taha Baadi/Jack Loutit (UK) def. Ben Koch/Stefan Latinovic (LSU) 6-2
- Welsh Hotard/Alessio Vasquez (LSU) vs. Eli Stephenson/Jaden Weekes (UK) 3-5, unfinished
Match Notes:
Kentucky 23-2; National ranking #4
LSU 16-13; National ranking #44
Order of finish: Doubles (2,1); Singles (2,1,4)