Perfect tennis weather drew a large crowd to Spalding G. Wathen Center Thursday afternoon, and those in the stands witnessed a nail-biting spectacle as the Bulldogs powered through to a 4-3 victory over visiting Loyola Marymount.
Both teams were reeling from tight losses to their previous opponents heading into the matchup. Fresno State head coach Evan Austin said the close nature of the contest Thursday was all too familiar.
“We’ve got a young team,” Austin said. “You know, we’ve been in a lot of these close matches, and we just have to keep putting ourselves in those situations to where we feel a little more comfortable and play a little more aggressive. We played a little bit better under pressure, and we just have to continue to get more and more guys that want to be in that role, and step up instead of shying away from it.”
Junior Nikolas Papic certainly didn’t shy away from that role, weathering a furious rally by Luke Bohuslav, who forced a third set, to take the deciding point for Fresno State’s victory.
Austin said the strategy at the end was to keep the points short.
“Their guy was cramping a little bit,” Austin said. “One thing we wanted to try to do was try to take control of the points, get him running and kind of make him make explosive moves. You know, not get into slower and longer points where he can just settle in and take a crack. We were trying to make him move quick.”
Papic said he enjoys being in those game-deciding situations, a place where he feels he can really thrive.
“I always enjoy playing the last match,” Papic said. “I’ve had that opportunity many times and in those situations I try to do my best, and I really like it actually. I feel like I kept it up, the intensity, while the other guy just couldn’t handle it. I was just intense, intense, intense.”
The Bulldogs started the afternoon by picking up the doubles point. The team of Euan McIntosh and Adam Glynn didn’t even have to finish their set.
Impressive 6-foot-6-inch Loyola Marymount freshman Errol Smith knotted things up with a two-set sweep of McIntosh. Fresno State countered with similarly dominant efforts from freshman Youssef Hassan, who had full command and support of the crowd and senior Sai Kartik Nakireddi, who picked up a 6-2 6-0 victory.
“It was a bit windy,” Kartik said. “So I think [the opponent] was struggling a bit and it’s our home court, so I had the advantage of playing here. And I was playing a bit better than I was the other day, my game was being consistent.”
With the win, the Bulldogs improve to 4-2 on the year while remaining perfect at home. After a couple of days off, the men will have to travel to Irvine to take on the Anteaters on Sunday.