The No. 3 North Carolina men’s tennis team lost for the first time of the 2017-18 season on Saturday, losing 4-3 to No. 6 Texas A&M in the quarterfinals of the ITA Indoor National Championships. The Tar Heels lost again in a consolation matchup with No. 2 Ohio State afterward.
What happened?
UNC began the tournament on Friday afternoon by taking down previously-unbeaten No. 22 Notre Dame. After securing the doubles point, Sigouin, Blumberg and sophomore Simon Soendergaard all won their singles matches to finish the 4-0 sweep for the Tar Heels against the Fighting Irish.
However, in the second round, the Tar Heels (8-2) couldn’t string together enough singles wins to get past the Texas A&M Aggies.
North Carolina started the contest by beating Texas A&M in two of out the three doubles matches to gain a point. The duo of Blumberg and Kelly started off duals competition by beating the Aggie pair of first year Patrick Kyson and senior Arthur Rinderknech.
Then, Sigouin and Kodali defeated Texas A&M’s first year Juan Carlos Aguilar and senior Jordi Arconada to secure the first point for the Tar Heels.
However, the only Tar Heels to win in singles were Blumberg and junior Blaine Boyden. Blumberg beat Kypson and Boyden defeated Aggies’ first year Barnaby Smith.
UNC also lost to No. 2 Ohio State in a consolation matchup on Sunday afternoon, 4-3. Blumberg took down Buckeyes’ senior Mikael Torpeggard in singles competition to finish the weekend 3-0 individually.