Cougars Win in Sibling Rivalry

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PROVO -- The No. 45 BYU men’s tennis team met success on the court Friday night, sweeping Montana State for a 7-0 victory.

“I think it’s been great for us to be at home and it’s nice to have such a big crowd like we did tonight,” BYU head coach Brad Pearce said. “We’ve been able to identify the weaknesses that held us back the last couple weeks. We’ve isolated those weaknesses and worked on them in practice, which has been really good for our team.”

Singles saw some sibling rivalry as Cougar Ricardo Campos took on Lander Jewett and Campos’s brother, Diego Campos of Montana State, took on BYU’s Roman Warias. Diego was defeated by Warias 7-5, 6-0, while Ricardo fought a tiring match with Jewett to complete the Cougar sweep (4-6, 7-2, (11-9)).

The brothers’ matches followed four straight-set singles wins from Cougars Patrick Kawka, Spencer Smith of Salt Lake City, Georgy Batrakov and Evan Urbina. Kawka and Smith both won 6-1, 6-1 against Markus Schleuter and Fletcher Keyes, respectively. Batrakov beat Alberto Fuentes 6-1, 6-1 to secure the win for the Cougars and Urbina defeated Pawl Turzanski 7-6, 6-4.

In doubles, Kawka and Urbina started the scoring off for the Cougars (4-3) with a quick win against Keyes and Turzanski 8-3, followed by Batrakov and Daniel Hwang’s 8-3 win against Fuentes and Prithiv Sivasubramaniam. Spencer Smith and Tyler Loong, a freshman from Orem, Utah, finished off doubles with their narrow 8-7 victory against Jewett and Schleuter.

“This match was nice, because we were able to give everyone on the team the opportunity to play,” Pearce said. “Some guys who work really hard don’t get to play as much, but it was great to give them the opportunity to play in front of a home crowd.”

The only player who didn’t participate in the match was Thomas Shubert, who was injured.

Up next, the Cougars head to Palo Alto, Calif., to take on No. 8 Stanford Friday.

No. 45 BYU vs. Montana State

BYU-7 Montana State-0

Doubles

1. Kawka/Urbina (BYU) def. Keyes/Turzanski (MS) 8-3

2. Loong/Smith (BYU) def. Fuentes/Sivasubramaniam (MS) 8-7

3. Batrakov/Hwang (BYU) def. Jewett/Schleuter (MS) 8-3

Order of finish: 1, 3, 2

Singles

1. Evan Urbina (BYU) def. Pawl Turzanski (MS) 7-6, 6-4

2. Spencer Smith (BYU) def. Fletcher Keyes (MS) 6-1, 6-1

3. Georgy Batrakov (BYU) def. Alberto Fuentes (MS) 6-1, 6-2

4. Patrick Kawka (BYU) def. Markus Schleuter (MS) 6-1, 6-1

5. Roman Warias (BYU) def. Diego Campos (MS) 7-5, 6-0

6. Ricardo Campos (BYU) def. Lander Jewett (MS) 4-6, 7-2, (11-9)

Order of finish: 4, 2, 3, 1, 5, 6