This match was supposed to be a challenge. It was supposed to be
a hard-fought battle between two elite teams. Instead, it ended up
being a cakewalk, a dominating statement made to the rest of the
country ““ the Bruins are here and they’re ready to
play.
Coming off a tough week of practice in which the No. 4 UCLA
men’s tennis team found out that Jean-Julien Rojer, a key
player on last year’s team, would not be returning for his
senior season, there were questions about how the team would
respond.
When the No. 15 Washington Huskies visited the Los Angeles
Tennis Center on Saturday, those questions were answered. In
arguably the team’s best match of the season, no Bruin
dropped a set en route to an overpowering 7-0 victory.Â
With the win, UCLA improves to 19-2, 5-0 Pac-10. Washington
drops to 15-5, 1-5 Pac-10 with the loss.
Head coach Billy Martin had expected the match to be one of the
toughest of the season.
“I really thought this would be a very hard-fought match
for us,” he said. “We were really prepared to
fight with lots of energy. Our guys were ready to go to
war.”
On the courts, the battle technique of the Bruins was far
superior to that of the Huskies.
UCLA secured the doubles point behind wins from Marcin Matkowski
and Rodrigo Grilli at No. 1 and Erfan Djahangiri and Alberto
Francis at No. 3.
The singles matches strictly consisted of Bruin domination.
Tobias Clemens, the nation’s No. 5 player, continued his
stellar play, disposing of No. 26 Matt Hanlin, 6-1, 6-3.
“I felt great,” he said. “I was hitting a lot
of winners and playing tough defense. It was a great match for
me.”
Unexpected greatness came from Marcin Matkowski, the
nation’s No. 40 player, at No. 2 singles, as he destroyed
Washington’s Alex Vlaski, ranked No. 10 nationally, 6-2, 6-2.
Matkowski hadn’t played a singles match for two
weeks. He missed last week’s matches while he was
competing for Poland in the Davis Cup.
“I was kind of surprised at the way I was playing,”
he said. “I didn’t expect to play that well in my
first match in two weeks.
“Over the last week I felt really tired, but I was able to
break him a couple of times and everything worked my
way.”
“I thought Marcin looked pretty darn good,” Martin
said.
In perhaps the best story of the day, senior co-captain Erfan
Djahangiri appears to have regained his early-season form. After
winning his first 13 matches of the season, he dropped three
straight before struggling to victory Friday in the Bruins’
6-1 victory against Oregon (8-11, 0-6 Pac-10). He appeared to be
his old self Saturday, defeating Christoph Palmanshofer, 6-0, 6-4
at No. 5 singles.
“I can finally play tennis again,” a relieved
Djahangiri said afterward. “This time I won’t stop my
win streak. I’ll take it all the way.”
In other action, Chris Lam defeated Ari Strasberg, 6-0, 6-4, at
No. 4 singles. The dominating first set was rare for Lam, a
notorious slow-starter.
Rodrigo Grilli played a smart match at No. 3 singles, beating
Fred Sundsten, 6-2, 6-2, and Lassi Ketola defeated Dillon Ruby,
6-2, 6-2 at No. 6.
The importance of the match is reflected in the Pac-10
standings, as the Bruins find themselves tied for first in the
Pac-10 with Stanford. The Cardinal visits the Bruins on
Friday, in what will surely be the biggest match of the season.
“I’m very, very pleased with the results from this
weekend, Martin said. “Now we get a chance to fight for
the Pac-10 Championship, and it’s at our place.”
Rojer seems forgotten, and the Bruins are focused on the task at
hand.
“We wanted to show everybody that without (Rojer),
we’re still one of the best teams, or the best team, in the
nation. I think we proved that today,” Djahangiri
said.