After securing the doubles point and a few early breaks in the singles rounds, No. 9 NC State men’s tennis lost its momentum and fell 4-2 to No. 18 Duke.
NC State (4-1, 0-1 ACC), with its top two competitors in No. 9 senior Martin Borisiouk and redshirt sophomore Jules Leroux losing their singles matches in straight sets, gave Duke (5-0, 1-0 ACC) an advantageous position. With freshman Charlie Camus battling on Court 4 and No. 85 redshirt sophomore William Manning on Court 3, the Pack needed both matches to realistically stay in the match. When Duke picked up its third win as Camus fell to Gerard Planelles Ripoll, the contest was all but over.
“Not pleased, obviously, with the outcome,” said head coach Kyle Spencer. “I thought Duke did a really good job of responding after losing the doubles point. I thought we didn’t do quite as good a job in terms of securing some first sets.”
Duke secured the initial set on five of six singles courts, jumping ahead despite NC State breaking serve early on three courts.
“We had a break on [Court 2], a break on [Court 3] and a break on [Court 4],” Spencer said. “And on 2 and 3, we gave those breaks back pretty quickly. So a little disappointing. We kind of let them back into the match, and once you do that, then everything’s fair game.”
The one member of the Pack to win his first set was Camus, who showed serious skill for a young freshman. But in later stages of the match, he could not find the winners he was searching for.
The only NC State player to win a point was Manning, who fought off a talented Blue Devil in Alexander Visser in an intense second-set tiebreak to stay alive.
“We knew those were matches that we thought we had to have today, and we split them, which is tough,” Spencer said. “I think we needed to get both of those to have a better opportunity. And I thought we would have a good opportunity at [Court 2] and it didn’t end up being that.”
On Court 2, Leroux fell 6-3, 6-2 to 2023 Singles All-American Pedro Rodenas. The Frenchman seemed to struggle throughout his singles match, even after a strong performance during his doubles match alongside partner freshman Darius Pop. Pop also lost his singles match in straight sets, falling 6-4, 6-2.
On Court 1, the Pack’s dominant Borisiouk — coming off a run to the semifinals of the NCAA Men’s Singles Championship in the fall — didn’t play his best tennis against Duke’s Cooper Williams.
“Martin’s coming off injury, so he didn’t have a lot of lead-up time coming into the match, and we kind of knew that,” Spencer said. “Everybody knew it was going to take six spots today and that those six spots were going to have to be disciplined and ready to fight.”
Despite a poor showing in the singles, the Pack fought hard for the doubles point, securing it in an intense 20-point tiebreak. Camus and Manning paired together, edged Duke’s pairing of Teddy Truwit and Visser.
“Good doubles point,” Spencer said. “We can get better in that category. And then look, we can play with anybody, but we got to make sure that we are disciplined and go out and finish off sets when we get the opportunity.”
The Pack will get that chance tomorrow as it faces Tennessee at 3:30 p.m. But stay tuned for a possible time change on the NC State men’s tennis X account due to the impending inclement winter weather.
