Mississippi State men’s tennis improved to 6-0 on the season and earned a spot at the Intercollegiate Tennis Association Indoor Championships next month with a sweep of Santa Clara and Auburn in Starkville this weekend.
The No. 7-ranked Bulldogs have never won the ITA Indoor National Championship before, but have a strong shot with one of the top doubles teams in the sport and a host of impressive players in the singles rotation.
MSU somewhat surprisingly lost the doubles match point in both of its wins over Santa Clara and Auburn, but rebounded well in the singles matches. The Bulldogs swept all six singles games against Santa Clara on Friday to advance against Auburn, and would have to repeat the feat to advance to the championships.
Niccolo Baroni and Mario Martinez Serrano delivered a strong 6-2 win to open the weekend against the No. 49-ranked duo of Nicholas Heng and Joseph Phillips, but Auburn got on the board with an upset win over No. 2-ranked Petar Jovanovic and Benito Sanchez Martinez. A loss by Bryan Hernandez Cortes and Michal Novansky meant that the Bulldogs had to make up ground on the scoreboard in the singles matches.
They responded, taking five of the six games to get past the Tigers.
The win was the 217th for head coach Matt Roberts, putting him just three shy of the program record for all-time wins.
MSU will travel to Memphis for its next match against the Tigers on Sunday, and will play its next home matches on Feb. 7 in a doubleheader against South Alabama and Alabama State.
The ITA Indoor Championships will begin on Feb. 13 with MSU traveling to either Waco or Dallas for the competition hosted by Baylor and SMU.
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