BYU blanks Montana 7-0 in Provo

Friday, March 5

Provo, Utah

1 PM

Montana

Brigham Young

3/5/2021 4:28:00 PM | Men's Tennis

Box Score

By: Montana Sports Information

Freshman Guillermo Martin forced a third set, but the bright spots were few and far between for the Grizzlies as the Montana men's tennis team dropped its first-ever dual match against the BYU Cougars 7-0 in Provo on Friday.

With warm weather settling in on the Wasatch Front, the match was Montana's first outdoor event of the season.

The loss moves the Grizzlies to 3-5 on the season, while BYU – who was picked to finish third in the West Coast Conference preseason coaches' poll – improves to 4-4.

"We ran into a good team. We had a couple spots where we could have got some wins, but they had a good crowd with lots of energy behind them, and they took care of business," said head coach Jason Brown.

Montana was competitive in the doubles round, with Milo Benn and Ed Pudney holding a 4-3 lead on court two when the point was called in favor of the home team Cougars. The no result keeps Benn undefeated in doubles as an individual so far this spring at 3-0.

On court one, Chase Bartlett and Oisin Shaffrey fell to BYU's Gajardo/Barnett pair 6-3, while on court three Moritz Stoeger and Pontus Hallgren also fell 6-3 to the Cougar's Hill/Tullis pair to keep the Griz within striking distance.

In Singles, Martin took an early lead over BYU's Dominik Jakovljevic on court six with a win in the first set but dropped the second to force the third set decider. The Grizzly freshman kept pace with Jakovljevic throughout the third to push it to a tiebreaker, eventually falling 6-3, 1-6, 6-7 (7) to clinch the sweep for the home team.

After building a 5-0 lead in the second set, Benn also went to a tiebreaker that, if he had won, would have brought about another UM three-set match. However, BYU's Sam Tullis held him off to win 6-3, 7-6 (5) and keep the Grizzlies out of the win column.

"Our goal with this trip is to get ready for conference, and this match will do that. It will definitely give us the motivation to improve on the practice courts. Now we just need to focus on Utah," Brown added.

Montana's challenging road trip to the Beehive State doesn't get any easier, as the Grizzlies now turn their attention to the University of Utah on Saturday, with the Utes receiving votes in this week's ITA Top-50 Poll. UM is set to play Utah on the outdoor courts at the Eccles Tennis Center in Salt Lake City at 3 p.m., with links to live scoring and live video available at GoGriz.com.