No. 5 Kentucky men’s tennis advanced to the NCAA Tournament Super Regionals with wins over DePaul and Illinois over the weekend.
The first win of the weekend came with a 4-0 sweep over the Blue Demons, where the Wildcats grabbed the early 1-0 lead with the doubles point clincher from Jaden Weekes and Eli Stephenson.
Freshman Jack Loutit secured the first singles point with a 6-3, 6-0 second set bagel victory. Tallying a bagel of his own, Charlelie Cosnet also won in straight sets 6-0, 6-2.
Sending the Wildcats to the second round was senior captain Josh Lapadat with his 6-3, 6-1 wins on court two.
“I think we did a good job of just staying locked in on every single match that we had today,” Lapadat said. “On every court we took care of business pretty well.”
The sweeping victory was in contrast to Saturday’s rematch against Illinois, which came down to the very last court as the Wildcats squeaked by with a 4-3 win.
Kentucky dropped the doubles point for just the second time out of its last 12 matches.
Tying the match for the first of several times was the captain, No. 28 Taha Baadi, who was the first to finish as he took down No. 26 Karlis Ozolins 6-3, 6-1 on court one.
Giving the fighting Illini the lead again, Weekes fell in straight sets 6-1, 6-4.
Swinging the momentum back in the Cats’ favor was Stephenson, who took 6-2, 6-4 victories, but Cosnet fell shortly after 6-3, 6-4 on court four.
Tying the match once more, Lapadat won his match despite being down 5-2 in the first, 7-6 (7-5), 6-2, putting all the pressure on the shoulders of Loutit.
Luckily, Loutit was no stranger to the moment.
Just a few weeks prior Loutit prevailed in the exact same spot, a three-set thriller to clinch the regular season SEC title for the Wildcats over No. 6 Tennessee.
After dropping his first set 6-1, Loutit managed to force the third with his 6-2 second set win. Down a break in the final set 4-2, Loutit found that extra gear and came back to clinch the win 6-4 in the third.
“I definitely didn’t think I’d be in that situation again this season at least,” Loutit said. “Honestly, I did it for my seniors. This could have been their last match. I was two games away from losing. I really just tried to dig deep for them.”
With a rematch with Harvard up next head coach Cedric Kauffmann will ensure his team doesn’t overlook their opponent.
“I tell them, everybody can beat us but we can beat anybody,” Kauffmann said.
This weekend’s wins secured at least one more home match for the seniors as Kentucky will take on Harvard at the Hilary J. Boone Tennis Complex for Super Regionals on Saturday, May 11, at 2 p.m. ET.
“I always would encourage anybody to just come and try to watch one match because you come back because the energy is so good, it’s so fun to watch,” Lapadat said.
