Men’s tennis season ends to Illini

The season ended for No. 67 IU Friday when it lost 4-1 against No. 12 Illinois in the quarterfinals of the Big Ten Tournament.

The doubles point was the x-factor in the change from IU’s dramatic 4-3 victory against Minnesota Thursday to their loss to Illinois Friday.

Against Minnesota, IU claimed the match’s first point with wins at No. 2 and No. 3 doubles. Against Illinois, IU lost the doubles point at No. 2 and No. 3 doubles.

“We had opportunities to win that doubles point,” IU Coach Randy Bloemendaal said. “We had match points at No. 3 and we were up a break at No. 1.”

Due to rain and thunderstorms leading up to match time, Friday’s match against Illinois was forced inside, giving the Illini an edge, Bloemendaal said.

“I think Illinois is a better team inside,” Bloemendaal said. “I’ve always thought their team performs better indoors and this year I felt the same way.”

After losing the doubles point, IU needed to win four singles matches to claim the match. That task proved too challenging against an Illinois team that features three First-Team All-Big Ten players in its lineup.

No. 1 singles sophomore Samuel Monette appeared primed to earn IU’s first point against the No. 8 player in the country, Illinois sophomore Jared Hiltzik.

Monette won the first set 6-3 and was playing as well as he has all year, Bloemendaal said.

“Played about as well as I’ve seen anybody in the Big Ten play all year in that first set,” Bloemendaal said. “He didn’t lose his serve for about two hours and 15 minutes and still lost the match.”

Monette’s serve remained unbroken throughout the first and second sets.

However, Monette was unable to break Hiltzik in the second set, leading to a tiebreak.
Hiltzik won the tiebreak and went on to win the third set 6-3 to clinch the match for Illinois.

“Jared hit some really good shots,” Bloemendaal said. “Like I’m not talking college level, I’m talking professional level. Those shots would have won any match anywhere.”

IU’s only point came from senior Dimitrije Tasic, whose 6-3, 3-6, 6-1 win secured an undefeated Big Ten Tournament from Tasic, IU’s only senior.

“I was just really proud of him because over the course of his four years it was kind of a sticking point with me and him that on the road, in tough situations, he wasn’t very consistent,” Bloemendaal said. “He did a great job, a great job. Things really started clicking in his head.”

In addition to Tasic, Bloemendaal said, things started clicking for his entire team, leaving the coach remorseful the season is coming to an end.

“Honestly, we ran out of season,” Bloemendaal said. “We were really starting to figure things out as a team.”

Bloemendaal said he questions what could have been if his team had started playing like this earlier in the season.

These questions about his young team left Bloemendaal feeling optimistic for what the future holds.

“One of the things we started to talk about was how would we look if we were at this level in January instead of working our way in and hitting a few stumbling blocks,” Bloemendaal said. “These guys are going to work hard going into the summertime, they know the expectations.

“Unfortunately we had a season like you’re going to have with a young team. We were trying to do something extraordinary.”