HOUSTON, Texas. – No. 51 Duke went on the road and came away with a 4-2 victory over No. 31 Rice on Friday in Houston, Texas.
Inclement weather moved the match indoors to the MET Tennis and Racquet Club in downtown Houston. The move from outdoors to indoors did not affect the Blue Devils as they earned their fourth straight victory to improve to 7-3 on the year.
"I am very happy to come out with a victory today against a tough Rice team,” said head coach Ramsey Smith. “We grasped the momentum early in the match by pulling out a tough doubles point. I stressed to the team that we needed somebody to step up and get that first singles win and (Jared) Pinsky answered the call. I was very impressed with Jared's focus from start to finish. He is playing extremely well."
Pinsky earned his second career win over a ranked opponent, defeating No. 103 Sam Garforth-Bles 6-1, 6-3 at the No. 4 position. Pinsky is now 15-8 overall on the year. The win put Duke up 2-0 in the match as they claimed the doubles point. Dylan Arnould and Reid Carleton won 9-7 at No. 2 to improve to 8-4 while David Holland and Torsten Wietoska won 8-5 in the third slot to improve to 8-3.
Arnould and Wietoska also earned singles victories. Arnould won in straight sets 6-3, 6-4 over Tobias Scheil at No. 3. He is now 12-9 on the season. Wietoska clinched the victory with a three-set win against Dennis Polyakov in the No. 5 spot of the order. Wietoska has won five straight singles matches. He is 14-5 overall and 8-1 in dual match play.
"Once again Torsten came through big for us,” said Smith. “He was down a break 2-1 in the third and then went on to win the last five games to win and clinch the match. He is showing a lot of maturity as a freshman and seems to play his best when the pressure is on. I felt comfortable with him in that situation."
Duke will begin a stretch of six straight home games next Wednesday. They will open up conference play against N.C. State at 3 p.m.
