Mississippi State sophomores Petar Jovanovic and Benito Sanchez Martinez were eliminated from the NCAA men’s tennis doubles championships in the quarterfinals Thursday, falling 6-3, 6-3 to Cleeve Harper and Eliot Spizzirri of Texas.
Still, both members of the No. 11 ranked doubles team in the country were named All-Americans by virtue of reaching the quarterfinals, becoming the 48th and 49th All-Americans in Bulldogs history. They are MSU’s first All-Americans since Nuno Borges, Strahinja Rakic, Giovanni Ordani and Niclas Braun in 2019.
Against the Longhorns and their 24th-ranked pairing, Jovanovic and Sanchez Martinez were broken in their first service game and trailed for the entirety of the first set. Harper and Spizzirri were dominant on the serve, only allowing MSU’s duo four break points all day, of which they converted none. Texas’ team won 80 percent of points on the first serve, compared to 65 percent for Jovanovic and Sanchez Martinez.
With the second set even at two games apiece, Harper and Spizzirri won three games in a row to take control of the match before wrapping it up a short time later.
Jovanovic and Sanchez Martinez helped the Bulldogs advance to the third round of the NCAA Tournament as a team, where they were eliminated by No. 1 seed Ohio State. MSU loses just two seniors, Nemanja Malesevic and Carles Hernandez, and is expected to have the rest of the lineup back for the 2025 season.
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