By Rico Chow '12

FAYETTEVILLE, Ark. – The No. 47 Santa Clara men's tennis team had a close, but disappointing 4-3 loss against the SEC foe No. 71 Arkansas Sunday morning on the Razorbacks own indoor courts. The Broncos are 5-4 overall this season and 1-1 in WCC action. Arkansas has 3-1 record in season. 

The Broncos will return to the home court to play against UC Santa Barbara on Mon., Feb. 21 at 11:00a.m.

The doubles point slipped away from the Broncos when Kyle Dandan and Nicholas Vinel junior pair suffered an 8-6 loss at No. 3 and teammates Tom Pham and Maxime Armengaud were defeated at No. 2 position, 8-5.

The singles action was very competitive. After the first loss at No. 6 action, Tom Pham, who won both singles and doubles matches vs. Iowa Saturday, defeated Mike Ward, 6-4, 6-2, at No. 5 position.

Santa Clara dropped the No. 2 position, but Kyle Dandan defeated Chris Nott, 6-3, 6-3, at No. 1 action to tie it up. Although freshman John Lamble brought a victory at the end of the match, 3-6, 9-7, 6-1, Vinel's loss against the Razonrbacks' Gregoire Lehmann in the third-set tiebreaker put a period to the match.

"Doubles was the key, we can't beat good teams on the road and lose doubles points when we have commanding leads and end up losing," said SCU head coach Derek Mills.

Go Broncos!

No. 71 Arkansas 4, No. 47 Santa Clara 3

Results

#1 Singles: SCU Kyle Dandan def. UA Chris Nott; 6-3, 6-3

#2 Singles: UA Matt Hogan def. SCU Maxime Armengaud; 6-3, 6-3

#3 Singles: UA Gregoire Lehmann def. SCU Nicholas Vinel; 6-3, 2-6, 7-6 (7-1)

#4 Singles: SCU John Lamble def. UA Nikolas Zogai; 3-6, 9-7, 6-1

#5 Singles: SCU Tom Pham def. UA Mike Ward; 6-4, 6-2

#6 Singles: UA Matt Walters def. SCU Eugene Muchynski; 6-2, 6-3

#1 Doubles: UA Walters/Hogan def. SCU Lamble/Muchynski; 9-7

#2 Doubles: UA Lehmann/Nott def. SCU Pham/Armengaud; 8-5

#3 Doubles: UA Ward/Zogai def. SCU Dandan/Vinel; 8-6