No. 14 Baylor MT Claims Doubleheader Sweep on Sunday

Sun Mar 9 21:16:54 CDT 2025

BAYLOR ATHLETIC COMMUNICATIONS – March 9, 2025

No. 14 Baylor MT Claims Doubleheader Sweep on Sunday
Baylor Has Won Five Consecutive Matches
 For more information contact: Josie Hutton; 254-709-7720,  josie_hutton at baylor.edu<mailto:josie_hutton at baylor.edu>

WACO, Texas -- No. 14 Baylor men’s tennis posted a doubleheader sweep on Sunday at the Hurd Tennis Center, topping No. 31 Cornell in the opener, 4-3 and blitzing Lehigh, 7-0 in the nightcap, stretching its win streak to five straight and giving the Bears wins in six of their last seven matches.

No. 14 Baylor (12-6) opened the doubleheader with a win over Cornell (9-5), before topping Lehigh (5-4).

The Bears opened up the day with Cornell by owning the doubles point, courtesy of wins on court 1 and court 3. BU then fought off a tight match to win on court 1 and 3, with the result coming down to a third-set tiebreak on court 5 with Alexandru Chirita, who outlasted his opponent to help the Bears secure the win.

Baylor cruised to the sweep in the nightcap, getting the doubles point on courts 1 and 2. In singles, the Bears earned the win with courts 1, 4 and 6 to claim the efficient win, and finished the sweet with wis on court 2, 3 and 5.

Baylor will return to action in Indian Wells, Calif., facing off with No. 28 Pepperdine on Friday and the winner of No. 17 Princeton and No. 40 Arizona State on Sunday. Both matches will be played at 11:30 a.m. CT.

CORNELL MATCH

Baylor used a tight finish to claim the opener vs. Cornell, 4-3 at the Hurd Tennis Center.

In doubles, No. 15 Oskar Brostrom Poulsen and Marko Miladinovic jumped out to a 4-2 lead on court 1 and posted a 6-3 win. On court 2, No. 79 Devin Badenhorst and Luc Koenig suffered a 6-4 loss. Louis Bowden and Zsombor Velcz helped the Bears clinch the point with a 6-3 win on court 3.

Cornell opened the scoring in singles, claiming a 6-4, 6-2 win on court 4 over Koenig.

Badenhorst, ranked No. 40 in singles, immediately answered the court 4 loss with a 6-2, 7-5 win on court 1 over No. 44 Radu Papoe to give the Bears a 2-1 lead.

Brostrom Poulsen, ranked No. 96 in singles, saw Cornell even the match at 2-2 with a 6-3, 6-3 loss on court 2.

After Koenig fell 6-4, 6-2 on court 4, Velcz, checking in at No. 99 in singles, posted a 6-2, 5-7, 6-3 win on court 3 to give the Bears a 3-2 lead.

Cornell answered with a 6-4, 6-4 win over Bowden on court 6. That left court 5 as the decider, featuring Alexandru Chirita and Nathan Mao. After Mao won the first set, Chirita posted a 6-1 win in the second to force a third. The match went into a third-set tiebreak, with Mao jumping out to a 3-0 lead. Chirita fought back to even the tiebreak at 5-5 and then finished off the win with the 7-5 result in the third.

LEHIGH MATCH

Baylor cruised to a 7-0 win over Lehigh in the nightcap of the doubleheader, winning the first two courts in doubles and claiming wins on court 1, court 4 and court 6 to clinch the match.

Baylor opened up the match with Lehigh with the doubles point, claiming courts 1 and 2. Bowden and Velcz posted a 7-6 win on court 1 and Badenhorst and Quintan Van Wijk cruised to a 6-1 win on court 2.

The Bears then went to work in singles, claiming early points on court 1, behind Brostrom Poulsen’s 6-3, 6-2 win. On court 6, freshman Luis Jose Nakamine posted a 6-3, 6-0 win to stake the Bears to a 3-0 lead.

On court 4, Arman Zamani posted a 6-4, 6-3 win to clinch the match for the Bears.

The Bears also got a 6-7, 6-1, 6-3 win from Koenig on court 2, a 6-2, 7-6 win from Bowden on court 3 and a 6-3, 7-5 win from Van Wijk on court 5.

QUOTABLE

“It’s been a long day. Tough conditions out here. We’ve had some really nice weather here. And the weather is about to get nice again. But today, it wasn’t that. It was pretty windy, cold, dark – it was just tough. We knew that going into the match with Cornell and we did a pretty good job of getting on top of them in doubles. We had some momentum going into singles and felt like we could carry that. Give them a ton of credit, they are very well coached, a veteran group and they got on top of us in a lot of spots and made it really hard. Hats off to Devin (Badenhorst), he was really composed. Very aggressive, very competitive from start to finish against one of the best players in the country. He was top-10 in the country last year, was an All-American. He’s a senior. He beat the No. 1 player in the country here at NCAAs in the fall, so these are great conditions for him and Devin was able to put a point on the board in straight sets, which we really needed.

“Unfortunately we found ourselves with our backs against the wall. Z (Zsombor Velcz) and Alex (Chirita) were in the third set, just down a break and it wasn’t looking good but we’ve been talking a lot about finding different ways to win, continuing to compete no matter what the score is and Z obviously ripped off a few games there and finished strong. Alex’s match was up and down – up a break, down a break, opportunities to win, match point at 6-5 and then gets down 5-0 in the breaker. I give him so much credit. He looked at me and said ‘I’ve got this, don’t worry’. No matter if he’s sure of it or not, speaking that into existence is a real thing and it matters. He was poised enough to play the 5-0 point really well. Got a good return down, now its 5-1. Did it again at 5-1 to 5-2, so now he’s serving at 2-5, hits a great serve wide, obviously gets a point penalty and now it’s 5-4 and the pressure is on the other guy. He played two of the best points of the whole match to get a little mini break at 5-5 and to serve it out 6-5. Big serve, first ball finished at the net. That is what all these guys dream off, to be able to play a 3-3 clinching match and be able to finish that. Ton of credit to him and the team. We are just finding different ways to do it each match. We’re learning how to win and that is not easy.

“In the evening, the guys did a pretty good job actually. Lehigh competed really hard. I was very impressed with their fight and energy and we were able to match that. Had some competitive sets in doubles and singles but ultimately we were able to pull away on all the courts. Winning is hard and winning 7-0 is even harder. Credit to the guys for that.”

- BaylorBears.com -

Josie Hutton | Associate Director of Athletics Communications (FB, T&F/XC, MTEN)
Department of Athletics | Baylor University
C: (254) 709-7720

[signature_2230589939]<http://www.baylorbears.com/>

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