SAN ANTONIO – The No. 37 UTSA Roadrunners men's tennis team (15-4) opened up its final week at home with a hard-fought Military Appreciation Match victory over visiting Denver (8-7) at the UTSA Tennis Center. The Roadrunners built on top of a clean doubles point and strong first set victories to defeat the Pioneers, 5-2, and grow their already phenomenal win streak to 13 matches.
Surpassing the 14-win 2018-19 team with Wednesday's victory, the Roadrunners now have the most wins since the 2014-15 squad that swept the Conference USA Championships and made the last NCAA Tournament appearance.
UTSA opened up heading in the right direction and quickly put away the doubles point against Denver via victories on the first two courts for Alan Magadan with Tiago Torres and Tomás Pinho with Sebastian Rodriguez with 6-3 and 6-4 wins, respectively.
UTSA logged first-set victories on four of the six singles courts to set course toward the win, with the first delivered by Pinho on court four, en route to a 6-2, 6-2 besting of Peter Sallay. However, his doubles partner, Rodriguez was first to finish for the initial singles point, putting away Conner Olsen on three, 6-2, 6-1 to record UTSA's first singles win of the day.
The Pioneers chipped away with a win on court two, as Nicolas Cuesta defeated Magadan, 6-3, 6-4, to draw the UTSA lead to 3-1.
While this week's Conference USA Athlete of the Week, Tiago Torres was locked in a back-and-forth three-set battle on the first court, the Roadrunners secured a key down-lineup victory. On six, Jackson Ross put away the clinch point with a 6-3, 6-4 win over Raffaello Papajcik.
Playing out all the singles courts, UTSA would earn one more score as Danijal Muminovic rallied from a first set loss to defeat Charlie Miller in fifth-court action, 4-6, 6-1, 10-5.
Quoting Coach Sergey Avdeyev
"We earned a great team win today. Every team that is here to play us is very excited and motivated. We knew that going into the match and we were ready. I'm happy with our doubles play. Some singles matches got off to quick, good starts for us and created momentum, although a few got overturned and we ended up losing them. Overall, we're happy with the win and ready to move onto the next one."
Doubles Results
Order of Finish: 1, 2
1. Alan Magadan/Tiago Torres def. Peter Sallay/Charlie Miller: 6-3
2. Tomas Pinho/Sebastian Rodriguez def. Nicolas Cuesta/Anish Sriniketh: 6-4
3. Miguel Alonso/Garrett Skelly vs. Daniel Sancho Arbizu/Raffaello Papajcik: 5-6 (unfinished)
Singles Results
Order of Finish: 3, 4, 2, 6, 5, 1
1. Daniel Sancho Arbizu def. Tiago Torres: 5-7, 6-4, 10-7
2. Nicolas Cuesta def. Alan Magadan: 6-3, 6-4
3. Sebastian Rodriguez def. Conner Olsen: 6-2, 6-1
4. Tomas Pinho def. Peter Sallay: 6-2, 6-2
5. Danijal Muminovic def. Charlie Miller: 4-6, 6-1, 10-5
6. Jackson Ross def. Raffaello Papajcik: 6-3, 6-4
Up Next
The Roadrunners close out their 2023 home schedule on Friday, March 24 with a Senior Day match versus William & Mary (6-6). Prior to the match, UTSA will honor their lone senior, Rodriguez.
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