Defending Champion Virginia Dethroned, Top Two Seeds Tested in NCAA Division I Men's Quarterfinals

©Colette Lewis 2024
Stillwater Oklahoma

Quarterfinal day for the NCAA Men's Division I Team Championships began with top-seeded Ohio State just a handful of points away from defeat before recovering to beat No. 8 seed Columbia 4-2; it ended close to midnight with No. 6 seed Wake Forest denying No. 3 seed Virginia's quest for a third straight title 4-1.

In between, No. 4 seed TCU rolled past No. 5 seed Kentucky 5-0 and No. 2 seed Texas rode an impressive comeback from fifth-year Eliot Spizzirri at line 1 to beat back the challenge from No. 7 seed Tennessee 4-2.

The courts at the Greenwood Tennis Center were ready for play just a few minutes after the scheduled 11:00 a.m. start despite rain overnight and during the early morning, and Ohio State came out strong taking the doubles point with wins at lines 3 and 1.

Given the depth of the Ohio State singles lineup, that could have been discouraging for the Lions, but they took four first sets in singles and pulled even when Michael Zheng beat Justin Boulais 6-3, 6-1 at line 1. Ohio State regained the lead less than a minute later with JJ Tracy's 6-3, 6-0 win over Nicolas Kotzen at line 3, only to see Columbia answer with Max Westphal's 6-2 ,6-3 win over Jack Anthrop at line 4. When Cannon Kingsley gave Ohio State a 3-2 lead with a 6-2, 6-4 victory over Alex Kotzen at line 2, the matches at lines 5 and 6 were deep in the second set, with Columbia having won the first set in both.  

Either Alexander Bernard at line 5 or Robert Cash at line 6 had to win a second set tiebreaker to keep the Buckeyes alive, and they both came through, with Bernard getting through his second battle with Hugo Hashimoto 7-6(5). Meanwhile Cash took a 6-2 lead in his tiebreaker with Henry Ruger, only to see Ruger win the next three points, including a shocking backhand volley miss by Cash at 6-4. But finally, on his sixth set point, including the two he failed to convert with Ruger serving at 4-5, Cash hit a huge first serve to close out the set, giving Ohio State a little room to breath.

Unfortunately for Columbia, Hashimoto began to show signs of cramping early in the third set, and at 3-1 took a medical timeout, for treatment. He moved a bit better after that, but resorted to serving underhand, and Bernard was in control of every point.

"You've got to focus on yourself still," said the sophomore from Florida, who had seen his 5-2 lead in the first set slip away. "He wasn't moving great there at the end, but I said to myself, I can't change how I'm playing. I have to keep doing the same things, keep my focus, lock it down and make him work for every single point, because obviously he was hurting a little bit."

"Bernie did a great job," said head coach Ty Tucker. "After taking a spill, where he had to get the blood off the knees and off the elbow and he was able to keep his focus. My man's undefeated for a reason."

Cash trailed Ruger 4-1 in their third set, but when the cramps hit Hashimoto, the window for Columbia's upset had closed, after battling the top team in the country for three hours and 45 minutes.

Ohio State will face No. 4 seed TCU in the semifinals Saturday, a rematch of this year's ITA Team Indoor final, which came down to Bernard and Tracy, both of whom won in three sets to give Ohio State a 4-3 victory.

TCU dominated Kentucky, taking the doubles point and five first sets in singles, with Jack Pinnington Jones at line 1 and Jake Fearnley at line 2 getting the simultaneous clinch, after victories from Lui Maxted at line 4 and Sebastian Gorzny at line 5.

Gorzny, coming back from a stress fracture that kept him out of the lineup for nearly two months, said the team relishes the chance to play Ohio State yet again.

"They beat us last year, same spot, final four 4-0 and we came back this year indoors, thought we had a chance, won the doubles point, lost a very close 4-3," said the sophomore from Texas. "So we know we can do it, so it feels like another opportunity to beat the Buckeyes."

While TCU had a straightforward win, Texas had anything but, with Tennessee rebounding from the loss of the doubles point to take four first sets in singles. Angel Diaz evened the match with a 6-1, 6-4 win over Siem Woldeab at line 5, but Cleeve Harper at line 6 was able to take a big lead in the second set over Tennessee's Younes Lalami, giving Texas a path. But the real turning point in the match came when Johannes Monday was unable to put away Eliot Spizzirri at line 1 after serving for the match at 6-4, 5-2, and the again at 5-4. Up 5-4, 40-30, Monday had two match points, but Spizzirri cranked a forehand winner on the first and got a double fault from Monday on the second and went on to close out the second set with his fifth straight game. 

Harper did get to a third set, after wins by Texas's Micah Braswell at line 2 and Tennessee's Filip Apltaur at line 5 had made it 3-2 Texas.

With Texas now having two chances to win the fourth point, their outlook improved, especially when Spizzirri got a break to take a 4-2 lead. Harper was in a tiebreaker with Lalami by the time Spizzirri closed out the match, finishing off Monday on his first match point at 5-3, 40-30.

"From 5-2 (down), the pressure kind of goes away," said Spizzirri, a fifth-year senior from Connecticut. "It's in his hands now, he's a huge server and was serving well, so I just thought to myself take it one point at time, grind my butt off and see what happens, and I got lucky here and there."

Texas will face the only upset winner of the day in Wake Forest, who ended the run of two-time defending champion Virginia with a 4-1 victory that was much closer than that score would suggest.

With the match starting more than an hour later than scheduled due to the length of the first three quarterfinals, only the doubles point, won by Wake Forest, was played in daylight. The lighting appeared to agree with the Demon Deacons, as they took five first sets in singles.

But even without their No. 1, Chris Rodesch, who was ruled out with mononucleosis yesterday, Virginia was not about to give up the title without a fight. Inaki Montes, playing at line 1 in Rodesch's absence, roared back from the loss of a 6-0 first set to Filippo Moroni to take the second, while Virginia also forced third sets at lines 6 and 2, while Wake Forest got a split at line 3, the only match in which they hadn't won the first set. 

The match was 2-0 for quite a stretch, after Luciano Tacchi defeated Alex Kiefer 6-2, 6-2 at line 4, before Wake's Holden Koons saved set points against James Hopper at line 6 and won the second set tiebreaker to make it 3-0 Wake Forest.

That obviously meant Virginia had to win every match still on court, and that wasn't impossible, although Luca Pow of Wake Forest was up an early break over Mans Dahlberg in the third. 

It was at line 2 that the match was decided however, with Wake Forest's DK Suresh Ekambaram getting the late third set break over Virginia freshman Dylan Dietrich. Montes closed out Moroni to get Virginia on the scoreboard, just as Suresh was serving for the match.

After one ace at 0-15, Suresh thought he had hit a second one at 30-all to reach match point, but Dietrich called it out, and the chair agreed with the call. Wake head coach Tony Bresky and assistant coach Brian Baker were incredulous that the chair had seen the ball out and protested vigorously, and when Suresh double faulted to go down 30-40, that call loomed large. But Suresh saved the first break point by a forehand that wrong-footed Dietrich, then elected to serve and volley on a second serve on the deciding point, and bounced the return out of Dietrich's reach to set off the celebration.

"After I lost that point(at 30-all), I thought what happened, happened," said the big-hitting sophomore from India, who transferred to Wake from NAIA Georgia Gwinnett this year. "I just wanted to focus on the next two points. There was no point to sulking at that moment, I just wanted to give 100 percent on the next point and that's what I did."

After such a late night, Wake Forest is no doubt happy to be off Friday, with the women taking to the Greenwood Tennis Center courts Friday for their quarterfinals. 

Women's NCAA quarterfinals (Friday ET)

Georgia[7] v Stanford[2], noon
Michigan[3] v Pepperdine[6], 2:30 p.m
Virginia[5] v Texas A&M[13], 5 p.m.
Tennessee[16] v UCLA[8], 7:30 p.m.

Cracked Racquets will provide coverage of all four quarterfinals at ESPN Plus.

Ohio State[1] d. Columbia[8] 4-2

Doubles

1. JJ Tracy and Robert Cash(OSU) d. Theo Winegar and Michael Zheng(COL) 6-4

2. Nicolas Kotzen and Max Westphal(COL) d. Justin Boulais and Andrew Lutschaunig(OSU) 6-4

3 Cannon Kingsley and Jack Anthrop(OSU) d. Alex Kotzen and Henry Ruger (COL) 6-4

Order of finish: 3, 2, 1

Singles

1. Michael Zheng(COL) d. Justin Boulais(OSU) 6-3, 6-1

2. Cannon Kingsley(OSU) d. Alex Kotzen(COL) 6-2, 6-4

3. JJ Tracy(OSU) d. Nicolas Kotzen(COL) 6-3, 6-0

4. Max Westphal(COL) d. Jack Anthrop(OSU) 6-2, 6-3

5. Alexander Bernard(OSU) d. Hugo Hashimoto(COL) 5-7, 7-6(5), 6-1

6. Henry Ruger(COL) v Robert Cash(OSU) 7-5, 6-7(5), 4-1, unfinished

Order of finish: 1, 3, 4, 2, 5

TCU[4] d. Kentucky[5] 5-0

Doubles:

1. Jake Fearnley and Pedro Vives(TCU) vs. Joshua Lapadat and JJ Mercer(UK) 5-4, unfinished

2. Sebastian Gorzny and Jack Pinnington TCU) d. Taha Baadi and Jack Loutit(UK) 6-3

3. Duncan Chan and Lui Maxted(TCU) d. Eli Stephenson and Jaden Weekes(UK) 6-4

Order of finish: 2, 3

Singles:

1. Jack Pinnington(TCU) d. Taha Baadi(UK) 6-4, 6-3

2. Jake Fearnley(TCU) d. Joshua Lapadat(UK) 6-3, 7-5

3. Pedro Vives(TCU) d. Jaden Weekes(UK) 7-5, 4-4, unfinished

4. Lui Maxted(TCU) d. Charlelie Cosnet(UK) 6-3, 6-1

5. Sebastian Gorzny(TCU) d. Jack Loutit(UK) 6-4, 6-4

6. Eli Stephenson(UK) v Tomas Jirousek(TCU) 7-5, 3-2, unfinished 

Order of finish: 4, 5, 1 & 2

Texas[2] d. Tennessee[7] 4-2

Doubles:

1. Eliot Spizzirri and Siem Woldeab(TEX) d. Angel Diaz and Johannus Monday (TENN) 6-3

2. Shunsuke Mitsui and Filip Pieczonka(TENN) d. Micah Braswell and Eshan Talluri(TEX) 6-3

3. Lucas Brown and Cleeve Harper(TEX) d. Filip Apltauer and Younes Lalami(TENN) 6-3

Order of finish: 1, 2, 3

Singles:

1. Eliot Spizzirri(TEX) d. Johannus Monday(TENN) 4-6, 7-5, 6-3

2. Micah Braswell(TEX) d. Shunsuke Mitsui(TENN) 6-3, 7-5

3. Gilles-Arnaud Bailly(TEX) d. Filip Pieczonka(TENN) 6-2, 6-3

4. Angel Diaz(TENN) d. Siem Woldeab(TEX) 6-1, 6-4

5. Filip Apltauer(TENN) d. Jonah Braswell(TEX) 7-6(5), 6-1

6. Cleeve Harper (TEX) v Younes Lalami(TENN) 5-7, 6-1, 6-6 (3-3), unfinished

Order of finish: 4, 3, 2, 5, 1

Wake Forest[6] d. Virginia[3] 4-1

Doubles:

1. Holden Koons and DK Suresh Ekambaram(WAKE) d. Edoardo Graziani and James Hopper(UVA) 6-3

2. Dylan Dietrich and Inaki Montes (UVA) d. Filippo Moroni and Matthew Thomson(WAKE) 6-3

3. Luca Pow and Luciano Tacchi(WAKE) d. Alexander Kiefer and Jeffrey von der Schulenburg(UVA)

7-5

Order of finish: 1, 2, 3

Singles:

1. Inaki Montes (UVA) d. Filippo Moroni(WAKE) 0-6, 6-4, 6-3

2. DK Suresh Ekambaram(WAKE) d. Dylan Dietrich(UVA) 7-6(4), 4-6, 6-4

3. Jeffrey von der Schulenburg (UVA) vs. Matthew Thomson(WAKE) 7-6(6), 4-6, 3-2, unfinished

4. Luciano Tacchi(WAKE) d. Alexander Kiefer (UVA) 6-2, 6-2

5. Luca Pow (WAKE) v Mans Dahlberg(UVA) 6-3, 5-7, 4-3 

6. Holden Koons(WAKE) d. James Hopper(UVA) 6-3, 7-6(5)

Order of finish: 4, 6, 1, 2