The Blue Devils responded to adversity in emphatic fashion over the weekend.
After suffering their first home loss, 4-3, to No. 15 Pepperdine (7-6) Saturday and losing their number three singles and doubles player, Torstin Wietoska, to injury the Blue Devils (11-2) seemed to be up against the ropes when facing No. 8 California (7-7) Sunday.
Duke did not wilt, however, and finished the weekend strong, decisively taking down the Golden Bears, 6-1.
“We’ve only lost two matches all year,” head coach Ramsey Smith said. “But bounced back nicely from both those losses, beating a top-10 team each time.”
In doubles, it came down to the No. 3 spot after Duke split the first two contests. Replacing Wietoska, sophomore Cale Hammond teamed up with Raphael Hemmeler for the first time all year and helped the Blue Devils capture the doubles point, winning a hard fought match, 9-7.
“The hero of the day in doubles was Cale Hammond,” Smith said. “He really stepped up in the pressure situations.”
With the momentum on its side, Duke started strong in singles play, winning the first set of their matches on four of the six courts. Its top singles player, 2nd ranked Henrique Cunha, won emphatically over Nick Andrews, 6-2, 6-0. At No. 5 singles, freshman Jason Tahir dominated Christoffer Konignsfeldt, 6-3, 6-1, continuing his hot 8-1 start to the dual-match season. The clinching performance, however, came from 19th ranked Chris Mengel, who beat 39th ranked Carlos Cueto 6-2, 6-2 at No. 2 singles.
“It was a really important match for us and Chris came through with flying colors,” Smith said. “Cueto was probably their best player on their team.”
In the contest against the Waves Saturday, the Blue Devils could not close out their opponent in doubles, losing a pair of 6-4 leads en route to surrendering the doubles point.
In singles, Fred Saba immediately evened the match with an emphatic 6-0, 6-0 victory at No. 4 singles. Pepperdine soon recaptured the lead, however, with a win at No. 6 singles. Soon after, Tahir won his match at No. 5 singles while Mengel lost his match to leave the Blue Devils trailing 3-2.
The match came down to the No. 1 singles match, where Cunha faced 18th ranked Sebastian Fanselow in a matchup of top 20 singles players in the country. After losing the first set 6-4, Cunha battled to a tiebreaker in the second set. In the tiebreaker, Cunque led 3-1 but Fanselow stormed back to take the tiebreaker, 7-4, and clinch the victory for Pepperdine.
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