University of Florida Team Page
The No. 11 Florida men’s tennis team fell to No. 13 California, 4-1, on Saturday in a consolation match at the 2013 ITA Division I National Men's Team Indoor Championship in Seattle, Wash. UF will face either No. 8 Oklahoma or No. 24 Washington on Sunday in its final match of the event.
Gators fell behind early after dropping the doubles point to the Bears. Cal’s Mads Engsted and Ben McLachlan beat UF’s Michael Alford and Florent Diep, 8-3, at the No. 2 position to get things started. The point was clinched on court one, when the Bears’ pair of Chris Konigsfeldt and Campbell Johnson took down Florida’s duo of Billy Federhofer and Gordon Watson, 8-6.
In singles, the Bears got another point as Johnson dealt Piro his first loss of the spring, winning 6-2, 6-0 at the No. 3 position. Florida got a point from Federhofer on court six, defeating Nikhil Jayashankar, 6-3, 7-6.
The remaining four courts split the first two sets, as the Gators tried to extend the match. After Diep dropped the first set, 1-6, against Konigsfeldt on court two, he fought back to win the second set, 6-4, and force a deciding third set. Diep couldn’t complete the comeback effort, losing 6-1, 4-6, 6-2, and Cal took a 3-1 lead in the match.
With Florida needing points from the final three matches, the pressure was on Alford, van Overbeek and Watson, who each won their first sets. On court one, Cal’s McLachlan stormed back to spilt sets with van Overbeek, while Alford dropped the second set to Engsted on court five. Watson got to a tiebreak in the second set, but couldn’t pull it out and went to a third set against Bayane at No. 4 singles.
The match was clinched on court one, as McLachlan closed out van Overbeek, 6-7, 6-1, 6-4.
