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Saturday, February 14, 2009

Georgia Reaches ITA Men's Team Indoor Semifinals with 4-1 Win Over USC


©Colette Lewis 2009--
Chicago, IL--

The No. 3 seeded Georgia Bulldogs got a major contribution from the bottom of their lineup to get past No. 6 USC 4-1 Saturday afternoon at the Midtown Tennis Center. After the doubles point was decided in Georgia's favor at No. 1, the Trojans pulled even when Robert Farah defeated Nate Schnugg 7-5, 6-2 and it stayed at 1-1 for a very long time.

Georgia held the advantage, taking first sets in four of the other five matches, and when Drake Bernstein beat Matt (f/k/a Mateusz) Kecki at No. 5 by a 6-4, 7-5 score, and Josh Varela defeated Jason McNaughton in three sets at No. 6, Georgia held a 3-1 lead. The Trojans were given hope when Jaak Poldman gained at split with Jamie Hunt at No. 2, but they needed Steve Johnson at No. 3 to do the same.

Against Javier Garrapiz, Johnson dropped the first set, and was broken at 4-4 in the second, meaning that Garrapiz was serving for both the match and the Georgia victory. Johnson played an outstanding game to break Garrapiz, who could do nothing but applaud the Johnson winners, but he couldn't hold his serve in the next game, and Garrapiz converted on his second opportunity to take a 6-4, 7-5 victory and send Georgia into the semifinals against Stanford.

For complete scores, see the ITA results page.

6 comments:

Anonymous said...

Is Kecki healthy or has Bernstein just improved that much?

Anonymous said...

Assuming the lineups are accurate, Justin Kronauge has yet to win a set at #2 in two matches. Huge upset for Tennessee. Ohio State bows out earlier than expected yet again. One final chance to step it up at NCAA's.

Anonymous said...

Kecki and Poldma needs to step it up . They're so capable .

Anonymous said...

In a recent article in the Athens Banner Herald, Dan Magill predicted that one day Bernstein would play #1 at Georgia, need I say more!!!!

Anonymous said...

I wonder what Magill would say about Kevin King (GT) who has been the best Jr in Georgia the past few years

Anonymous said...

Dan could very well have been saying about Kevin had he chosen Georgia. Only supporting the Bulldog position vs. Kecki.