Griz drop season opener to Fighting Hawks 3-4

Saturday, January 14

Missoula, Mont.

10:30 AM

Montana

North Dakota

1/14/2023 3:32:00 PM | Men's Tennis

Box Score

By: Montana Sports Information

A young and undermanned Montana men's tennis squad dropped its season-opener to the senior-laden North Dakota Fighting Hawks 5-2 on Saturday at the Peak Racquet Club in Missoula.

With a lineup built of four seniors and two juniors, UND ground out a momentum-boosting win in doubles to start the match before overpowering UM on the top three courts in singles.

Montana, conversely, took the court with two juniors and four underclassmen and was without the services of Tom Bittner at the top of the lineup, who was out sick.

The bottom of the Grizzly lineup pulled out UM's three wins on the day, with two coming after UND had clinched the win.

Sophomore Sam Baldwin rolled over Nikita Snezhko in straight sets on court four for UM's first team point of the afternoon.

Making his return from injury, Guillermo Martin picked up a win in his first dual in over a year, beating Alex Petro 6-2, 6-1 in straight sets on court six for Montana's second win of the day.

Freshman Baltazar Wiger-Nordas earned the first dual win of his career on court five, bouncing back from a first-set loss to beat Riley Odell in a superbreaker 3-6, 6-3, 1-0 (7) for the third Grizzly win.

"We really had some guys with some nerves out there today. Some of them just came back to the states from winter break like four days ago, so there's an adjustment period," said head coach Jason Brown.

"But hats off to North Dakota. They're a well-coached, veteran team that's loaded with seniors, and they showed it. They fought hard, did the right things, got momentum after doubles, and took care of business."

In doubles, UND's strength at the top of the lineup shone through on court one. With the two highest doubles UTRs on the court, Snezhko and Gerhard Sullwald ran out to an easy 6-1 win over Gustav Theilgaard and George Russell, giving the visitors the early momentum.

But the second and third doubles positions were a different story. The Griz and Hawks went neck-and-neck on courts two and three, with multiple lead changes in each match leading to both eventually tied 5-5.

Montana would force a tiebreaker on both courts as well to leave the all-important doubles point hanging on a knife edge. But unforced errors plagued the Griz, with Fernando Perez and Baldwin falling 6-7 (5) in the breaker.

With a 1-0 lead heading into singles, UND made quick work of UM at the top of the lineup. Moritz Stoeger and Perez dropped their matches on courts two and three, respectively, in straight sets to give the visitors an early 3-0 lead.

Baldwin put the Griz on the board with his own straight set win on court four, while Gustav Theilgaard battled through a third set that would end up being the decider.

On court one, Theilgaard rebounded from a first-set loss to win the second before running out of gas in the third set against Sullwald 6-3, 3-6, 6-3 in the match that would clinch the win for the visitors.

Wiger-Nordas and Martin Would go on to pick up two more wins, bringing Montana within a point in the 4-3 team final.

The Griz now prepare for two more matches on the road next week, traveling to take on Whitworth in Spokane before facing Eastern Washington in a nonconference dual.

"I was really proud of the bottom of our lineup for stepping up after the match was clinched. I'm honestly going to take a lot of positives out of this. I think this was the worst this team is going to be, and if that's the case, which I'm positive it is, we're going to be just fine."