SANTA CLARA, Calif. – Repeating its performance from its home opener, the Santa Clara men's tennis team cruised to a 7-0 rout of Holy Names University on Saturday afternoon.
Despite surrendering nine points in doubles, the Broncos captured the point and found their rhythm in singles, rolling to six straight-set wins as a unit to improve to 2-0 in the dual match season.
"I think we did pretty good," said senior Ashot Khacharyan. "Our goal was to win both matches and that's what we've done for our first couple of matches so that's a good start."
Opening up play, the freshmen pairing of Jeffrey Liang and Kamran Khan jumped out ahead of their opponents 5-0. Moving with pace and working their placements, the duo grabbed their first victory of the season with a 6-1 result and put the Broncos ahead early.
On neighboring Courts 2 and 3, the Santa Clara tandems of Khacharyan and Andrew Gu along with Connor Garnett and Robert Seby found themselves in back-and-forth battles with the Hawk pairings. Trading the first seven points in their match, Gu turned up his serve and Khacharyan remained poised in front of the net with his return shots to eventually hold off Matthew Halligan and Hugo Colpart by a score of 6-4. In almost identical fashion, Garnett and Seby suffered through a few spurts of service and return errors but managed to close the door in the end, capturing the 6-4 victory.
"We came out with high energy in doubles and that really helped up," said Seby. "It carried over into singles nicely."
In singles, Seby kept Santa Clara's momentum rolling. Facing Halligan, the Santa Clara freshman opened up the first set ahead by a score of 2-1. After trading the next several points, Seby capitalized on his opponent's double fault to take a 5-3 lead. The Oro Valley, Arizona native captured the set and cruised in the second frame to grab his fourth victory of the season, 6-4, 6-1.
"I mishit a few balls in that first set but I settled down, started putting some air under the ball and pressed forward to gain an advantage in the second set," said Seby.
Playing on Court 4, Seby's doubles partner, Garnett, gave Santa Clara its third point of the day with a 6-1, 6-4 result. Now with five singles victories to his name this season, Garnett played on his toes in the attacking portion of the match and utilized precise return placements to down Bernardo Moraes.
Moments after Garnett's victory, Khacharyan sealed the team victory on Court 1. Running his opponent from the start, the senior found himself in the lead 5-0 in the first set. After capturing the eventual 6-2 result in set number one, Khacharyan repeated his performance in the second. Up 3-0 and choosing his opportunities to attack on the offensive end, Khacharyan came away with a 6-2 result to give Santa Clara its second win of the season.
"I think I played well," he said. "I think everything was pretty fine but I still feel like I have room for improvement."
With the victory in hand, Santa Clara played out its three remaining matches on Courts 3, 5 and 6. Sebastien Mathieu grabbed his second consecutive victory to open up the season with a 6-4, 6-1 result over Ivan Parra. Gu, down 6-5 in set number one playing against Colpart, responded to tie the set at 6-6 and powered up his serve in the tiebreaker to claim the set 7-6. Continuing to work his serve in the next frame, the Santa Clara freshman came away with a 6-2 result. Rounding out the sweep, Khan roared to a 3-0 lead in the first set courtesy of a forward attacking game plan and managed to fend off Nikola Solaja 6-4, 6-4.
Next up, the Broncos host Fresno State University on Saturday afternoon at noon at the Degheri Tennis Center.
"Fresno State is a good team," said Seby. "We will need to have even more energy than we had today when we play them."
