The Washington men's tennis team lost to Michigan 4-3 to fall to 1-1 on the season.
The evening started on a strong note with the Huskies taking the doubles point by winning two of the three matches. The pairings of Davis and Douglas, and Foley and Stewart each won their match 6-4. Juniors Kawika Lam and Enzo Sommer fell 6-7 (4-7) to Alex Knight and Runhao Hua, the No. 19 doubles pairing in the country.
Singles matches did not start out as smoothly.
Michigan won each of the first four matches that completed to clinch the victory early. The first match to conclude was on court 1 where senior Mitch Stewart fell to No. 9 Alex Knight 6-2, 6-2.
Sommer and Piers Foley lost in straight sets, 3-6, 3-6, and 4-6, 4-6 . The last of the four to wrap up was Amit Batta against Carter Lin. Batta lost the first set 4-6, was broken late in the second set and wound up losing 5-7.
Things turned for Washington as the night went on, winning the last two matches of the day in spectacular fashion.
Jack Davis breezed early on to a 6-2 victory in the first but had a little bit more difficulty as the match progressed. The freshman was able to hold on to win a lengthy second set and won 7-6 (9-7). Davis is now undefeated early on in his UW career.
The final match of the night was between senior Jake Douglas and No. 20 Runhao Hua. Hua made quick work of the first set to win 6-2 but Douglas picked up a big break in the second set and won it in the tiebreaker 7-5 to extend the match to a third set. In the final set Douglas won 6-4. The win over a top-20 opponent will be a big confidence booster for Douglas moving forward this season.
Washington will look to bounce back from this loss when it hosts Pacific on Jan 27 at 4 p.m.
Reach reporter Kyle Gehler at sports@dailyuw.com. Twitter: @KyleGehler
