Game, set, match: Men’s tennis records monumental win over BYU

Utah State men’s tennis coach Clancy Shields and his team accomplished something Saturday that had never been done before in school history. The Aggies defeated the BYU Cougars by a team score of 4-3.

“What a great college match for both teams,” said Shields, who is in his second season at Utah State. “These are the matches that remind our players why we work so hard, and this historical moment will be something these guys share together for the rest of their lives.”

In the history of the the tennis program, which has existed since 1964, Utah State had never beaten BYU. The team entered Saturday’s match in Provo with USU on a 50-game losing streak to the Cougars.

With the match tied up at three points each everything came down to the final singles match between Sebastian Schneider from Utah State and Aidan Carrazedo from BYU. Carrazedo won the first set 6-2 and looked like he was going to take the second set as well as the match. Carrazedo had a 5-2 lead when Scheider came from behind to win 7-6 in a tie breaker. Schneider was able to keep his momentum going and never trailed in the final set. He won 6-3 to give his team the win.

“So many great individual efforts by the team,” Shields said. “Really proud of all the guys and especially Sebastian for never giving up and finding a way to come back and clinch the match.”

The match started off with doubles where BYU won two of the three matches to take control 1-0 early. In singles play Utah State came back to quickly take a 2-1 advantage when sophomores Karan Salwan and Dennis Baumgartner both won in straight sets. Baumgartner defeated Jacob Sullivan 6-3, 6-4 and Salwan beat Jeremy Bourgeois 6-2, 6-1.

BYU took the next two singles matches to regain the lead at 3-2. The Cougars’ Shane Monroe beat Jack Swindells in three sets 3-6, 6-4, 6-2. Andrey Goryachkov won in in a third set tiebreaker 4-6, 6-1, 7-6 to beat Utah State’s Marcus Frirtz. Freshman Jaime Barajas tied the match at 3-3 by defeating Francis Sargeant in straight sets.

“This is only one match, but it is a statement for the season, and we are going to ride this momentum,” said Shields. In December he signed a five-year contract extension to remain with the team. “We have set some tough goals this year, and we have knocked off our first one. Now on to the next one.”

— kalen.s.taylor@aggiemail.usu.edu

Twitter: kalen_taylor