Jan. 21, 2005

Results

TULSA, Okla. - After opening the 2005 season with a victory on Friday, the Lamar men's tennis team saw ran into a two tough opponents during the remainder of the Martin Luther King holiday weekend, dropping a pair of 7-0 decisions at the University of Tulsa and at SMU in Dallas.

LU (1-2) opened the season in a neutral site match against the University of Central Oklahoma in Tulsa on Friday, topping the Bronchos 4-1, before taking on Tulsa at Michael Case Tennis Center on Saturday. The Cardinals then made a stop in Dallas on Monday before returning to Beaumont.

On Saturday, Tulsa swept through all three doubles matches to capture the doubles point. The Golden Hurricanes' No. 41-ranked doubles team of Achim Roth and Aleksander Charpantidis posted an 8-1 win over Lamar's Dean Clower and Ignacio Melus at the No. 1 position. Lamar's No. 2 combo of Emilio Kirby and Juan Pablo Alatorre recorded the most competitive match, dropping an 8-5 contest to TU's Diego Camacho and Andy Connelly.

In singles play all six Cardinal players came up on the short end of straight set decisions. Senior Dean Clower, playing in the No. 6 spot, lost a hard-fought contest to TU's Lucques Maasdorp, 6-4, 7-5 (5).

On Monday the Cardinals lost their second 7-0 match to SMU. Lamar's doubles tandem of Clower and Melus notched the only Cardinal doubles victory by topping the Mustangs' Paul McNaughton and Federico Murgier, 9-8.

Unfortunately, that was the only victory for LU as all six singles matches went in favor of SMU. Clower, a native of Broken Arrow, Oklahoma, turned in the only three-set singles match at the No. 5 position against SMU's Murgier. Clower lost the first set, 6-2, but rallied to win the second set 7-5. A fierce third-set battle, which featured a 7-6 tie-breaker, ended at 7-6 in favor of Murgier.

The Cardinals return to action this weekend, taking on Belmont on Fri., Jan. 21 and Arkansas-Little Rock on Sat. 22 in Little Rock, Arkansas.