Senior Jake Douglas prepares to return a serve against Princeton.
The Washington men's tennis team dominated it's way to a 6-1 win over UC Davis to move to 5-1 on the year.
One notable absence from the win was senior Mitch Stewart. The move was made with an eye toward the future and the grueling upcoming schedule that includes the ITA Indoor Championships next week.
“We had a couple matches last weekend and we’re going to be playing five matches over nine days,” Head coach Matt Anger said. “I picked him to rest today to make sure he’s ready for Sunday, but also next weekend.”
The doubles point went back and forth in all three matches. The team made an adjustment with Stewart out, and freshman Alexis Alvarez and sophomore Amit Batta were the beneficiaries. They replaced the team of Stewart and Piers Foley and won 6-3. Alvarez was impressive in his first action as a Husky.
The freshman fed off the energy of the home crowd in his first match of his young Washington career.
“It was an amazing feeling, I’ve been waiting for this moment for awhile now.” Alvarez said. “I was glad I had the support of the crowd, my teammates, and my coaches. It felt great to be out there.”
His patience has been noted throughout the season and it was nice to see him finally get a chance to prove his skills during game action.
“He’s playing just as well as a lot of guys on the team, he’s been patient waiting for his opportunity,” Anger said. “He gets along so well with the guys, all the guys were fired up for him.”
Washington went on to win the doubles point with a tiebreak won by Jack Davis and Jake Douglas. Despite coming away with the doubles point, It was far from the team's best doubles performance this season.
“I thought we could have played a little sharper throughout the doubles,” Anger said. “We have been, and I think can be, sharper in the doubles.”
The momentum from the doubles win carried over early as each player won their first set in singles.
Junior Enzo Sommer kept this momentum going and was the first to finish, winning 6-1, 6-3. This was followed in quick succession junior Piers Foley winning 6-4, 6-3.
The scoring hit a bit of a lull before newly ranked No. 48 Douglas clinched the match for the Huskies with a 6-3, 6-4 win.
The final two matches went to a third-set tiebreak because the match was already clinched before they went to their final set. Washington split these two matches as freshman Davis won his 10-4 to win the match, while Batta lost a heartbreaker 10-8 to give UC Davis its only point on the day.
Washington is right back at it on Sunday morning against Wisconsin at 10 a.m.
Reach reporter Kyle Gehler at sports@dailyuw.com. Twitter: @KyleGehler
