UCLA men’s tennis coach Billy Martin wasn’t
expecting the Bruins to be in top form for their season-opener
against Azusa Pacific on Thursday, and they weren’t.
Still, though UCLA showed the effects of a long offseason, by
the end of the match, the Bruins shook off enough rust to earn a
7-0 sweep.
The second-ranked Bruins needed to win a tiebreaker to secure
the doubles point early on but seemed to have a much easier time in
singles, with only two of the six matches going to a third set.
Azusa Pacific came into the match as the No. 1 ranked team in the
NAIA, which led Martin to admit that the Cougars could beat 75-80
percent teams in the NCAA’s Division I.
“This match left a good taste in my mouth,” Martin
said. “I knew we’d be rusty early, since it’s our
first match of the season. But I wouldn’t want us to be
playing at our best right now so early in the season.”
Three Bruins played their first match at the Los Angeles Tennis
Center on Thursday ““ Benjamin Kohlloeffel, Mathieu Dehaine
and Jeremy Drean.
Kohlloeffel became the Bruins’ No. 1 starter when Martin
decided to bench Luben Pampoulov after the doubles match to give
him some rest. Kohlloeffel got off to a slow start in his singles
match against the Cougar’s Sam Fletcher, but led 4-3 in the
first set, and didn’t drop any another games en route to a
6-3, 6-0 match.
Due to NCAA rules, Kohlloeffel had to sit out last season after
transferring to UCLA from Germany. He had been practicing with the
team at the Los Angeles Tennis Center for over a year, but had not
played a match there until Thursday.
“I was a little bit nervous in the beginning,”
Kohlloeffel said. “I was a little bit tight out there.
It’s always different to play in a match instead of
practicing.”
No. 4 starter Dehaine won his match easily against Adam Davidson
6-1, 6-2.
“It felt good to be out there,” Dehaine said of his
first match as a Bruin. “It’s always better to start
your season off with a win.”
Drean, who was inserted into the lineup at No. 6 after Pampoulov
was given a rest, had to play a third set 10-point tiebreaker,
which is done to quickly finish individual matches when the overall
match has been decided. Drean won the third set and his match
against Tom Jelsma, 3-6, 6-1, (12-10).
“I was a little nervous, I wanted to do really well in my
first match,” Drean said.
Drean also said he was worried about his hamstring, which he had
injured three weeks earlier. Fortunately, Drean said he did not
feel any pain during Thursday’s match.
At court No. 2, Alberto Francis had the toughest challenge of
all of the Bruins, facing the No. 1 ranked player in the NAIA in
Boris Bakalov. Francis won in three sets, 3-6, 6-3, (10-6).
In other singles scores, UCLA’s Chris Lam beat David
Goodman 6-2, 6-2 at court No. 3 and UCLA’s Kris Kwinta beat
Gordon Hong 6-3, 6-4 at No. 5.
In doubles, UCLA’s No. 1 team of Francis and Kwinta fell
to Fletcher and Davidson 8-5. At No. 2, Pampoulov and Kohlloeffel
beat Bakalov and Jelsma 9-8 (2) and at No. 3, Dehaine and Lam beat
Hong and Goodman, 8-6.