The 11th-ranked Tennessee Volunteers (6-2) upended No. 15 Duke by the score of 4-1. Saturday's match in Tennessee featured close battles in doubles play, but only one singles victory for Duke. With this win, the Volunteers avenged a 4-1 loss to Duke at the National Team Indoors earlier this month.
"I thought we played well in doubles," coach Jay Lapidus said. "It was not one of our best matches in singles, though. I don't know why, but we didn't play well."
The Volunteers began the match strongly with Adam Carey's and Jake Olsen's victory in the third doubles spot over Duke's Jason Zimmerman and Yorke Allen, 8-5.
The Blue Devils then tied up the doubles series when the top-seeded duo of Philip King and Michael Yani won six consecutive games en route to a 8-6 victory over Peter Handoyo and Mark Dietrich.
"Philip and I were down early, but we fought back," Yani said. "We stayed in it to win six games in a row."
With the teams splitting the first two matches, the No. 2 spot became the deciding factor for the doubles point. Tennessee's Simon Rea and Mario Toledo sneaked away with a 7-1 victory in the tiebreaker for a 9-8 defeat of Duke's Joel Spicher and Alex Bose. With two doubles victories, Tennessee took a 1-0 lead in the contest.
The Volunteers then dominated the singles play, earning victories in three of the top four spots.
With a 4-1 overall lead, the referees stopped the match early, for the Volunteers had already won the best-of-seven battle.
"I think we were a little down emotionally after losing the doubles point," Lapidus said. "It took away some of our momentum."
Tennessee notched its first singles point when Toledo won a 6-4, 6-2 battle against Duke's Alex Bose at the No. 2 spot. The Volunteers then went on to gain a 3-0 lead in the overall contest when Rea handily defeated Zimmerman 6-3, 6-1 in the fourth spot.
"They're tough," Yani said. "They have two guys who just came back from the Davis Cup, so they're a good team and they played well."
The Blue Devils' sole singles victory came for Yani, who recorded his first win of the season. Yani cruised to a 6-3, 6-2 triumph over Adam Carey.
"I played really well," Yani said. "I'm really happy, but obviously our goal is to win as a team."
The Volunteers clinched the match with Peter Handoyo's victory in the top singles spot over Philip King 6-4, 6-4. Handoyo just returned to Tennessee last week after playing in the Davis Cup for Indonesia.
"Philip has won so many for us this season, but it was just not his day," Lapidus said. "Everyone has his off day, and he was just not on top of his game."
The matches in the fifth and sixth spots, which featured Duke's Joel Spicher against Tennessee's Dietrich and Allen against Wade Orr, respectively, did not play to completion once the Volunteers garnered an insurmountable 4-1 advantage.
With only four available courts, these two matchups had to wait to play, and both were in the beginning of the first set when Handoyo's victory determined the outcome of the day.
"Mike had a very good match," Lapidus said. "I think that we were just not clicking in the other three spots. We have to now focus on our upcoming ACC schedule and matches against Georgia Tech and Illinois, both of which are quite good teams."
The Blue Devils have the week off from match play before they host Georgia Tech this Saturday.
"We need to work hard and keep up our intensity levels," Yani said. "Though we're 1-6, we can't get down. We had a tough beginning part of the season, playing a number of top-10 teams. Though it's not our greatest start, the key is not to get down and keep working hard."
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