The Owls came away with a 1-1 record In the first two conference matches of the 2017 season, splitting their two matches against East Carolina and Connecticut.
On Friday, the Owls dropped a close match to East Carolina, 4-3.
“It was a great college match with a great and very intense atmosphere,” coach Steve Mauro said. “It could’ve gone either way and I was happy with how the guys fought.”
The Owls started off strong, winning two of the three doubles matches from the teams of sophomore Artem Kapshuk with senior Vineet Naran in the first position and sophomore Uladzimir Dorash with freshman Francisco Bohorquez in the third position.
Temple grabbed two singles victories, getting a 4-6, 6-4, 6-3 win from Dorash in the third flight and a 5-7, 6-4, 6-4 win from sophomore Florian Mayer in the fourth spot. Junior Thomas Sevel, who just arrived with the team in January, lost his match in a tiebreak by a final score of 3-6, 6-4, 7-6(3).
“It’s going to take a little bit more time to get doubles a little bit stronger and to play more consistent in singles,” Mauro said. “I think if we played them again I’m confident that we could beat them.”
On Saturday, the Owls wasted no time putting Friday’s results behind them, defeating UConn in commanding fashion by a score of 7-0.
The team started off strong, sweeping all three of its doubles matches.
In the first and second positions, the teams of Kapshuk / Naran and Mayer / Sevel both won their matches handedly, with scores of 6-3 and 6-1, respectively. The third seeded team of Dorash / Bohorquez was tested, but won the match, 7-5.
The Owls won all of their singles matches, including senior Filip Stipic who was playing in the sixth position in place of freshman Eric Biscoveanu, who is currently sidelined with left knee instability.
Following this weekend’s play, the Owls are now 4-5 with a 1-1 American Athletic Conference record. The team’s next task will be traveling to Washington D.C. on Wednesday to take on George Washington, which is 6-4 this season.
“It was great to get a conference win,” Mauro said. “Hopefully, it will give us more confidence going into our next match against George Washington.”
Dan Wilson can be reached at danielwilson20@temple.edu. Follow The Temple News on Twitter @TheTempleNews and @TTN_Sports.
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