It took over fours hours and went down to the final match, but in the end the No. 10 men's tennis team couldn't pull off a win over arch-rival and 17th-ranked North Carolina, losing to the Tar Heels 4-3.
At one point late in the match, North Carolina needed to win just two points-one at the No. 6 spot and one at the No. 3 spot-to clinch the win. The Tar Heels Tony Thomas ended up winning at No. 6 over Duke's Jordan Wile, but the Blue Devils' Peter Ayers held off Brint Morrow to force a third set.
The final set of the Ayers-Morrow match would determine the winner of the regular season Atlantic Coast Conference championship. Ayers fought Morrow to a 3-3 tie, but that was all he had left in him, as the Tar Heel senior won the next three games to capture the match.
"Peter's a very good fighter," Duke head coach Jay Lapidus said. "Last year, in the same position, he clinched the ACC Tournament for us. He's still a little injured, and that hurt him in the third set."
The Blue Devils entered singles competition on an emotional low, losing two of the three doubles matches to give the Tar Heels a 1-0 advantage. Morrow joined fellow senior David Caldwell, ranked 44th in the nation, to upset the ninth-ranked doubles team of Ayers and Rob Chess at No. 1 doubles 8-4. Carolina won the doubles point when Rob Tedesco and Paul Harsanyi defeated Wile and Adam Gusky at No. 3 doubles 8-6
Chess said going into the match the Blue Devils knew Carolina had strong doubles teams and that the doubles point would be important to win. Still, Lapidus believed Duke could win four of six singles matches. From the way the Blue Devils opened singles play, it looked as if he was right. Freshman Dmitry Muzyka easily won his match over Tedesco 6-4, 6-2. Junior Adam Gusky won his match at No. 5 singles over Paul Harsanyi 6-3, 6-0 to give the Blue Devils a 2-1 advantage with four matches left on the court.
The Tar Heels evened the competition at 2-2 when Caldwell knocked off Chess at the No. 1 position 7-6, 7-6. Chess opened the first set 2-0, but then lost five of the next seven games to go down 5-4. Chess then broke Caldwell's serve to even the set at 5-5. Caldwell answered that by breaking Chess' serve on a love-game, giving him a 6-5 advantage and another chance to serve for the set. Chess responded by breaking Caldwell's serve with his own love game, forcing the tiebreaker. In the extra play, Caldwell easily won 7-3.
In the second set, the two players never broke each other's serve and entered another tiebreaker. Chess grabbed a 3-2 lead, but two double faults handed Caldwell a one-point advantage with the serve. Caldwell won the next three points to close out the match.
"Tiebreakers come down to one or two points," Chess said. "Your intensity gets up a little bit. I tried to step it up, but [Caldwell] stepped it up a little more."
The Blue Devils regained the lead when Gusky defeated Harsanyi at the No. 5 spot 6-1, 2-6, 6-3. All Duke needed to do was win one of the remaining two matches to seal the win.
At No. 6, Wile had fought back from a 6-2 first set loss to Thomas to win the second set 7-5. In the third set, Wile was down 5-2, yet won three straight games to even the final set at 5-5. The comeback fell short, however, as Thomas won the final two games to clinch the match and the point for the Tar Heels.
"I like the way that Jordan hung in there," Lapidus said. "He just kept fighting. That's all we can ask of our players."
Wile's loss left Duke's hopes in the hands of Ayers. In the second set tie-breaker, Ayers quickly went up 6-2, then loss five straight points to face a match point. Yet he hung on to win the next three points to force the third set.
The loss on Thursday afternoon dropped the Blue Devils to 14-5 overall and 5-2 in the ACC. The win for the Tar Heels cemented a perfect undefeated ACC season.
Lapidus is hoping the loss Thursday will only help motivate his team for its last match of the year against Clemson on Saturday as well as for the upcoming ACC Tournament. He noted that last season the Blue Devils lost to North Carolina during the regular season and then came back to win the ACC Tournament.
Chess is also looking forward to facing the Tar Heels once again. He plans to use the memory of this loss to motivate his play the next time Duke faces UNC.
"I'm going to picture the way the Carolina fans were hooting and hollering," Chess said. "They just have no class. If one of us is tired, we're going to use that to motivate us to take it to them and stick it up their ass."
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