The top-seeded UCSB men’s tennis team beat No. 4 Hawaii 4-1 to advance to the Big West Championship and avenge their single conference loss this season. The regular season champion Gauchos (17-5, 5-1) will face No. 3 UC Irvine in the championship match who they shutout 4-0 on Apr. 10.
UCSB cruised to two doubles wins to clinch the first point. On court one, Phillip Jordan and Kai Brady beat Andre Ilagan and Karl Collins 6-2 and on court two, Pablo Masjuan and Victor Krustev also won 6-2 over Blaz Seric and Axel Labrunie.
Moving onto singles, Brady added a second point for the Gauchos when he finished off a 6-0, 6-4 victory over Collins.
Kilian Maitre made things interesting with a 0-6, 6-3, 6-1 comeback win over Gianluca Brunkow, bringing the Rainbow Warriors within a point.
Masjuan made sure Hawaii didn’t get any closer, extending the lead to 3-1 as he defeated Labrunie 6-3, 6-4 and put Santa Barbara on the brink of clinching the win.
Jordan finished things off, earning a thrilling three set win over Ilagan. After winning the first set and dropping the second, the RS sophomore trailed 4-5 in the third set. Jordan went on to win the final three games to complete the 6-3, 2-6, 7-5 win and send the Gauchos to the championship.
Daniel Messinger writes about sports for UCSB.
email: sports@newspress.com
