Gamecocks Drop 4-3 Heartbreaker at LSU

April 2, 2016

Pos.	*Singles (4, 3, 6, 1, 5, 2)**	Score
1.	#69 Jordan Daigle (LSU) d. #93 Gabriel Friedrich (SC)	7-6 (2), 6-3
2.	Justin Butsch (LSU) d. Andrew Schafer (SC)	6-7 (9), 6-4, 6-1
3.	Harrison O’Keefe (SC) d. Gabor Csonka (LSU)	6-4, 6-1
4.	Alex Fennell (SC) d. Nikola Samardzic (LSU)	6-0, 6-1
5.	Boris Arias (LSU) d. Thomas Mayronne (SC)	3-6, 6-4, 6-3
6.	Wood Benton (SC) d. Simon Freund (LSU)	6-1, 6-4

Pos.	*Doubles (2, 1)**	Score
1.	#10 Daigle/Arias (LSU) d. Friedrich/O’Keefe (SC)	6-4
2.	Trinh/Butsch (LSU) d. Mayronne/Swank (SC)	6-2
3.	Csonka/Korinek (LSU) vs. Fennell/Schafer (SC)	5-5 (susp.)

BATON ROUGE, La. — South Carolina men’s tennis built a 3-1 lead at the midway point of singles, but No. 44 LSU rallied and won a pair of hard-fought three-set matches to give the Gamecocks a 4-3 loss on Friday at the LSU Tennis Complex. Junior Alex Fennell, sophomore Harrison O’Keefe and redshirt freshman Wood Benton scored singles victories for the Garnet and Black in the loss.

The Gamecocks battled tough throughout doubles, but the point would go LSU’s way. Running with a revamped doubles lineup, junior Sam Swank and sophomore Thomas Mayronne looked strong early on, but ultimately fell, 6-2 at No. 2. Carolina nearly flipped the score as No. 3 was even at 5-5, and sophomores Gabriel Friedrich and O’Keefe were a deuce point away from the same score at No. 1, but the deciding point went to LSU, giving the Tigers the early advantage..

Trailing, 1-0, Carolina came out recharged, storming to first-set wins on four courts. Fennell was first to post a victory, earning a quick 6-0, 6-1 triumph of freshman Nikola Samardzic at No. 5 that gave him his third-straight singles victory and got the Gamecocks on the board. O’Keefe and Benton weren’t far behind as O’Keefe also tallied his third straight-singles victory, posting a 6-4, 6-1 win over sophomore Gabor Csonka just before Benton closed out senior Andrew Korinek, 6-1, 6-4.

LSU trimmed the lead to 3-2 as Friedrich came up short in a first-set tiebreaker before falling in a tight 7-6 (2), 6-3 contest. After winning their first sets, Mayronne and junior Andrew Schafer both went to third sets where the Tigers ultimately prevailed. Mayronne was topped by senior Boris Arias at No. 5, while Schafer fell to junior Justin Butsch at No. 2.

The loss drops the Gamecocks to 10-11 overall, 2-5 in SEC play. The Tigers, meanwhile, improve to 11-8, 3-5 in the SEC.

Quotables: Head Coach Josh Goffi

“We came up a little short today, and we are going to move on from this pretty quickly hopefully. Our guys have done a great job of building each day of the season and are now playing good tennis as a result. We got a little unlucky today with the timing of the 35-minute inclement weather break. We were in complete control of the match with winning five of six first sets in the singles matches and it stalled our momentum. Credit goes to LSU for capitalizing on the momentum break. We need to take the positives from this match and prepare for a top-10 team on Sunday.”

Match Changer

The Gamecocks won four of six first sets, but the Tigers forced a pair of matches into third sets where they were able to earn a split in singles and claim the 4-3 victory.

Notables

South Carolina suffered its fourth 4-3 loss of the season.
Sophomore Harrison O’Keefe maintains the team-lead in wins with 14 this spring and 27 overall.
Junior Alex Fennell has now won three straight SEC matches in singles play.
Freshman Wood Benton returned to the singles lineup and provided a stellar performance to earn his first SEC win and 20th singles victory of 2015-16.

Up Next

The Gamecocks will head over to College Station, Texas, on Sunday for a matchup with No. 7 Texas A&M at 1 p.m. ET. Carolina then returns home next weekend for its final two regular-season home matches.