UCLA men’s tennis easily picked up its fourth and fifth consecutive wins this past weekend.
After taking the doubles point, decisive straight-set wins by freshmen Martin Redlicki, Austin Rapp and senior Dennis Mkrtchian helped the Bruins (13-6, 4-0 Pac-12) shut out the Arizona Wildcats (8-15, 0-4) 4-0 on Friday.
“The first five games on every court we were just cruising,” Rapp said.
In his singles match, Redlicki defeated a visibly frustrated David Mushayev, 6-2, 6-3, who Redlicki said was trying to get under the Bruin’s skin by yelling and playing aggressively.
“As the match progressed I think he saw that he had less and less of a chance … so he was trying to get into my head,” Redlicki said.
At one point, Redlicki responded to his opponent by returning a ball with a trick shot between the legs. Redlicki said this was to show he was unaffected by Mushayev’s attitude and further agitate the Wildcat.
Despite the standing scores, coach Billy Martin noted an overall lack of a strong mental game during the matches on Friday. He said he was unhappy with the No. 2 doubles’ sluggishness and with sophomore Joseph Di Giulio’s four-game loss following his initial 5-0 lead.
“That’s got to be mental,” Martin said, adding that it was difficult for the team to feel motivated against “probably the weakest team we’ve played all year.”
Martin said the team’s focus was marginally better the following day against Utah (10-10, 0-4 Pac-12) – another complete Bruin domination at 7-0. All games were played out in two sets with no Ute winning more than four games against any Bruin.
Echoing sentiments expressed during the previous day, junior Karue Sell also said it was difficult to stay completely focused against weaker teams.
“It’s not like we know we’re going to win, but we know it’d be really tough to lose,” Sell said.
Sell said the two days were good preparation for meeting Stanford and Cal next weekend. With overall records of 12-4 and 16-5 respectively, and both at 4-0 in the Pac-12, Stanford and Cal will definitely demand a high level of focus from UCLA throughout the entire weekend. Being consistent mentally will potentially play a much bigger role in Northern California than it did this past weekend, Martin said.
“If you’re sloppy mentally in a match like this, it’s more apt to be sloppy … in a (more difficult) match,” Martin said.