April 23, 2010
WEST LAFAYETTE, Ind. - The Purdue men's tennis team dropped a 4-3 decision to 59th-ranked Iowa on Friday afternoon on the Basham Courts inside the Schwartz Tennis Center.
"You have to give credit to Iowa," head coach Pawel Gajdzik said. "They competed hard and won a lot of close first sets in singles. They were just tougher than us today. It was nice to see Slavko (Bijelica) get his first Big Ten singles win of the season, and Branko (Kuzmanovic) played hard as well. We need to start bringing our doubles momentum into singles and carrying that success over. We will challenge our players to play with high energy tomorrow against a very good Minnesota team."
Purdue (11-13, 1-8 Big Ten) jumped ahead early by winning the doubles point for the fourth straight match and 13th time this season. Reinoud Haal and Austen Kauss gave Iowa (12-8, 4-5) an early advantage in the point with an 8-0 win over sophomore Thomas Wilson and senior Paul Foley at No. 2. The Boilermakers battled back to take the final two decisions and win the point as seniors Slavko Bijelica and Branko Kuzmanovic defeated Will Vasos and Tommy McGeorge 8-2 at No. 1 before senior P.J. Rose and junior Eric Ramos took down Marc Bruche and Patrick Dwyer 8-6 at No. 3 to clinch the point.
The Hawkeyes came out firing and claimed the match by taking the first four singles matches completed. Bruche opened the scoring with a 6-3, 6-3 win over Rose at No. 1 before Kauss earned a 6-3, 6-4 triumph over Wilson at No. 6. McGeorge pulled Iowa within one point of the team win with a 6-2, 6-4 victory over Foley at No. 5, and Haal clinched the match when he finished a 6-3, 6-4 win over Ramos at No. 4.
The Boilermakers refused to quit, however, and won the final two singles matches. Bijelica fought back after dropping the first set to take down Vasos 3-6, 6-1, 6-4 at No. 3 and earn the 14th singles win of his senior season. Kuzmanovic then completed a straight-sets defeat of Nikita Zotov 7-5, 6-2 at No. 2 that snapped a brief two-match losing streak and moved him into second on the team with three conference victories.
Purdue wraps up its regular season Saturday by hosting 35th-ranked Minnesota at 11 a.m. ET. Admission is free, and live results can be found at purduesports.com.