Sports > April 10, 2008

By Alex Botoman | Staff writer

The weather may have been nice in Florida, but the results weren’t for the No. 28 ranked men’s tennis team as they dropped road matches to No. 9 Florida State on April 4 and No. 27 Miami on April 6.

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Sophomore Andrew Brasseaux serves while doubles partner junior Carlos Salmon prepares for the return. The Deacs went 0-2 April 4-6 in road games at Florida State and Miami. (Kelly Makepeace/Old Gold & Black)

The Deacons fell to 15-8 (6-3) on the season and currently sit in fourth place in the ACC.

The road trip began with an April 4 matchup against Florida State. Wake came out on the wrong end of a 7-0 loss, although the match was much closer than the final score indicated.

The Seminoles jumped off to an early 1-0 lead by winning the closely contested doubles point.

At No. 2 doubles, Florida State’s Sam Chang and Maciek Sykut cruised past junior Carlos Salmon and sophomore Andrew Brasseaux with an easy 8-1 victory.

The Deacons answered at the No. 1 position with an 8-5 win by the No. 11 ranked tandem of junior Cory Parr and sophomore Steve Forman over the No. 16 ranked pair of Jean-Yves Aubone and Clint Bowles.

This left the doubles point to be decided by an exciting match at No. 3 between Wake’s team of senior Mariusz Adamski and sophomore Jason Morgenstern and the Seminoles’ pair of Drew Bailey and Brad Mixon. With the score tied at 8-8 the teams played a tiebreaker to determine the winner.

Bailey and Mixon eked out an 11-9 win in the tiebreaker to take the doubles point for Florida State.

Many of the singles matches would be similarly close. Chris Cloer picked up another point for the Seminoles with a 6-2, 6-2 win over Brasseaux in the only straight set match of the day.

No. 29 Aubone hung tough to put Florida State up 3-0 with a 6-2, 3-6, 6-4 win over No. 86 Forman at the No. 1 position. The Seminoles clinched the match when No. 71 Chang took down Adamski with a 3-6, 6-4, 6-1 win at the No. 3 spot.

The match ended in a controversy as Head Coach Jeff Zinn pulled his players out of the remaining matches rather than letting them play out the third sets.

Because the Florida State coach did not agree to let the matches stop, the Deacons were charged with forfeits in the remaining matches, leading to the 7-0 final score.

Attempts to reach Zinn for comment were unsuccessful.

At the time of the retirements, Parr was down 6-3, 4-6, 2-0 at No. 2, Morgenstern was losing 6-2, 4-6, 2-1 at No. 4, and freshman Jonathan Wolff was down 5-7, 6-4, 1-0 at No. 5.

The Deacs finished off the road trip with a close 4-3 loss to Miami on April 6.

Wake lost the doubles point after being upset at the No. 1 position

The Hurricanes’ No. 36 duo of David Rosenfeld and Vivek Subramanian posted an 8-2 win over Brasseaux and Morgenstern.

Miami clinched the doubles point through the No. 35 ranked team of Daniel Vallverdu and Carl Sundberg’s 8-4 upset of No. 11 Parr and Forman at No. 1.

The Deacons picked up an 8-4 win by Wolff and Adamski at No. 3.

Miami stretched out the lead to 2-0 with Rosenfeld’s 6-2, 6-4 victory over Adamski at No. 3.

At the No. 1 position, No. 58 Parr picked up one of the biggest wins of his career, with a 6-4, 6-3 upset of Vallverdu, the No. 5 player in the country, to keep Wake within reach at 2-1. No. 86 Forman pulled the Deacons even with a 6-2, 7-5 win over Subramanian at No. 2. Morgenstern put the Wake up 3-2 with a 6-3, 6-3 win over J.C. Whitner at No. 4.

Barnabas Carrega rebounded from a rough start to keep the Hurricanes alive with a 1-6, 6-4, 7-5 victory against Salmon at the No. 6 spot.

Sundberg sealed the win for Miami by taking down Wolff at No. 4, 1-6, 6-3, 6-3.

Currently, the Deacs have a 15-8 overall record and a 6-3 record in the ACC, placing them fourth in the ACC standings.

The Deacons will finish off the regular season with a road trip to take on No. 32 Virginia Tech on April 11, followed by Virginia, the No. 1 team in the country, on April 13.

Virginia Tech closely trails Wake in ACC standings, ranked fifth, while UVA holds first place in the conference.