After a weekend which saw Georgia’s men’s tennis team face stout competition from Texas Christian University and Virginia Tech, Bulldogs head coach Manuel Diaz said his team had succeeded in their first truly competitive challenge.

“It was a tremendous accomplishment to beat a good Virginia Tech team 7-0,” Diaz said following his team’s victory on Monday. “For a while there it looked like we could have lost two of the first singles matches and every match was really, really competitive.”

While the victory continued the Bulldogs’ streak of three-straight sweeps over opposing teams, Diaz said the matches were much closer than the score indicated.

MANUEL DIAZ

Such matches are not so rare in college tennis, according to Diaz.

“This happens from time to time,” he said. “It’s the way [they] go. I’m not going to say we’re fortunate. We really earned that win. I think any time you win a match like this — and I’m going to forget it was 7-0 — it’s just like [Virginia Tech head] coach [Jim] Thompson said, ‘It could have gone any way.’ Our guys did a great job of winning those close points the right way.”

Senior Ignacio Taboada agreed that it was good to start the season out on a strong note.

“Yeah, it’s a great win,” he said. “We’re here at the beginning of the season but a lot of it was on the line in order to get to the National Indoors.”

The victory, combined with the team’s defeat of TCU on Sunday, assured the Bulldogs a spot in the ITA National Team Indoor Championships, which take place Feb. 17-20 in Charlottesville, Va.

The National Indoors began in 1973 and the Bulldogs have taken part in the tournament every season except for 2003, winning the tournament twice (2006, 2007) and reaching the finals six times (1982, ’94, ’95, ’97, ’98, and 2009).

Taboada looking to improve even as expectations increase

Senior Ignacio Taboada is shouldering a heavier load in his second season since transferring from the University of Miami.

After playing primarily at courts five and six for the Bulldogs last season, Taboada has played exclusively at court four in all three dual matches this season.

Taboada is also ranked higher than he has ever been before, entering the preseason with a No. 26 singles ranking.

So when Taboada dropped his first set against a Virginia Tech opponent on Monday, the senior knew he had to get back into the match.

“I got down 0-4 in the first set and I was feeling really dizzy, I felt like I was going to throw up,” Taboada said.

Taboada battled back to force the set to 3-4, still in his opponent’s favor.

However, controversy struck as he made a call that he said ‘was his call to make’ but that his opponent disagreed with.
“There was a controversy where he started screaming during the point because he thought he had won the point, so I stopped the ball because it was my call to make, because he had already screamed once before in the set,” Taboada said. “Well, the referee just gave me the point and they just made a huge controversy of it. The guy was just trying to get in my head.”

Though Taboada would drop that first set, the momentum of the match was turned to his favor as he won the last two sets 6-2 and 7-5.

Even with the hard-fought victory in hand, Taboada knew he needed to play better.

“I have a few things to improve on,” Taboada said. “Like I said, I didn’t play my best. I have to work on my backhand a little, keep improving on my serve and forehand.”

Still, the most important message Taboada got from the match was that he and his team could respond to difficult challenges in a positive way.

“I was really proud of not only myself, but on the whole team competing,” Taboada said. “We were all playing some really close matches there and we all just recognized the moment and played through those tough moments and pulled it out.”

Doubles teams still not set, Bulldogs look forward to next challenge

Diaz isn’t afraid to make statements with his strategy on the court.

That’s why it was not surprising to see him play around with the doubles and singles rotations Monday against Virginia Tech, moving freshman Nathan Pasha into a doubles team with Hernus Pieters while replacing Pasha in singles with No. 101 Campbell Johnson.

“We’re not really quite set on our doubles combinations, we still are looking at different options and Nathan has played some great doubles this year so we wanted to get him back there – the experiment continues,” Diaz said.

Johnson won his first match of the dual-match season, 6-4, 7-5 while playing at court six.

Meanwhile, the duo of Pasha and Pieters contributed to Georgia winning the doubles point, defeating their opponent 8-4.

The Bulldogs will look to further test and strengthen their lineups in their matchup against East Tennessee State on Saturday at 1 p.m. at the Lindsey Hopkins Indoor tennis facility.