USU men’s tennis sweeps pair of weekend matches

The Utah State Men’s Tennis team continued its strong play, sweeping a pair of matches against Pacific and Idaho on Friday and Sunday, respectively. The win pushes the Aggies to 12-7 on the season while pushing their win streak to four matches.

Ranked No. 49 in the nation, Utah State began the weekend with a 4-0 sweep of Pacific that also featured a sweep in the doubles point to begin the match. The Aggies then dominated the top three spots to clinch the match.

“It was an awesome match for us,” said USU head coach James Wilson. “I definitely think it was our best match so far this year in terms of intensity and competitiveness.”

In the No. 3 match, senior Jack Swindells swept Alex Giannini 6-3, 6-1. Then juniors Kai Wehnelt and Jaime Barajas both completed sweeps in their matches to take the match for the Aggies. Wehnelt swept reigning West Coast Conference Player of the Year Miguel Diaz 6-2, 6-4, while Barajas swept Tadiwa Chinamo 6-3, 6-2. The remaining matches were left uncompleted.

“That’s the best I’ve seen Jack play all year,” Wilson said, “and for Kai to close out that match was good for him. Jaime just continues to play very, very well for us. It was a great day, and hopefully we can keep building on this.”

The Aggies immediately built off of their win against Pacific, sweeping every match Sunday against Idaho, ultimately winning 7-0.

“I thought everyone really competed hard and came out with purpose from the start,” Wilson said following the match. “That was my message to the team, to not let their opponents hang around. I felt like everyone did that for the most part, so that was good for us.”

After another sweep of the doubles point, the Aggies began singles play by winning the first set of every singles match of the day. Utah State was able to sweep matches in spots two through six, as Swindells picked up the win along with junior Andrew Nakajima, sophomores Samuel Serrano, Jonas Meier, and freshman Sergiu Bucur. Only Barajas was taken to a third set before eventually taking the match 6-4, 6-7(7), 10-6 to extend his career-best eight match winning streak.

“We’re just trying to improve everyday, so this was a good step,” Wilson said.

Next up, the Aggies begin Mountain West Conference play at home by taking on San Diego State this Saturday at 1:30 pm.