Vols Drop Tightly-Contested Road Match at #12 Kentucky, 4-3

Friday, April 8

Lexington, KY

5 PM

University of Tennessee

Kentucky

KNOXVILLE, TN - 2022.01.12 - Tennessee vs. ETSU

Vols Drop Tightly-Contested Road Match at #12 Kentucky, 4-3

April 08, 2022 | Men's Tennis

Box Score Box Score

LEXINGTON, Ky. – The fifth-ranked Tennessee men's team won the doubles point and singles matches on courts one and four Friday, but dropped a 4-3 decision to No. 12 Kentucky on the road.

The loss is just the second for Tennessee (17-6, 5-4 SEC) when it wins the doubles point this season. Kentucky (16-6, 7-2 SEC) is now 8-2 in home matches this dual season.

Kentucky's clinch came at No. 5 singles, breaking a 3-3 tie as #84 Joshua Lapadat overcame Tennessee's Angel Diaz 4-6, 6-1, 6-4. Prior to its clinch, Kentucky also claimed singles wins on courts two, three and six.

Sophomore Johannus Monday returned to the lineup for the Vols Friday, picking up where he left off with Mark Wallner at No. 3 doubles, earning a 6-4 win over Liam Draxl and JJ Mercer. With the win, Monday and Wallner are 9-0 as a pairing this season, with each of those victories coming in dual matches. The UT duo earned a break on the deuce point of the match's eighth game to tie it at 4-4 before eventually taking the match.

On court one of doubles, the 79^th-ranked pairing of Adam Walton and Pat Harper took down Kentucky's Francois Musitelli and Millen Hurrion in a tiebreak, 7-6(4) to clinch the doubles point for Tennessee. The Vols have now won the doubles point in 14 matches this season. For Walton, the win marks the 95^th doubles win of his career, needing five more doubles triumphs this season to become the sixth Vol in program history to accrue 100 career doubles and 100 career singles wins.

In singles action, freshman Shunsuke Mitsui earned Tennessee's second point, tying the match at 2 apiece with a 4-6, 6-3, 7-6(5) over Kentucky's #95 Musitelli. Mitsui went up a break early in match as he took a 2-0 lead in set one, but Musitelli came back for the first-set win. In set two, Mitsui jumped out to a commanding 4-1 lead and held serve to go up 5-3 in the second set and later sent it to a third. Set three saw Mitsui hold serve on a decider to take a 4-3 lead and after trailing 2-4 in the third-set tiebreak, the freshman phenom won five of the next six points to claim his 27^th overall singles win of the season and improve to 17-3 (7-1 SEC) in dual singles matches.

On court one, Tennessee's #14 Walton gave the Vols a 3-2 lead with a hard-fought 7-6(1), 6-7(6), 6-2 victory over #30 Liam Draxl on court 1. Trailing 4-5 in the first set with Draxl serving, Walton earned a key break on deuce point that tied the set at 5-5. Walton jumped out to a 3-0 lead in the tiebreak and took it 7-1, before Draxl took the second-set tiebreak, 8-6. After two grueling sets, Walton went up a pair of breaks at 4-0 and cruised to a 6-2 third-set win.

UP NEXT
Tennessee travels south on Interstate 65 to face in-state rival Vanderbilt in Nashville Sunday. First serve is slated for 1 p.m. ET.

RESULTS
Doubles

1. #79 Pat Harper/Adam Walton (UT) def. Francois Musitelli/Millen Hurrion (UK) 7-6(4)
2. Gabriel Diallo/Joshua Lapadat (UK) vs. #19 Emile Hudd/Shunsuke Mitsui (UT) 6-6 (2-0), unfinished
3. Mark Wallner/Johannus Monday (UT) def. Liam Draxl/JJ Mercer (UK) 6-4

Order of Finish: (3,1)

Singles

1. #14 Adam Walton (UT) def. #30 Liam Draxl (UK) 7-6(1), 6-7(6), 6-2
2. #16 Gabriel Diallo (UK) def. #5 Johannus Monday (UT) 6-0, 6-1
3. Millen Hurrion (UK) def. #45 Emile Hudd (UT) 7-6(3), 6-3
4. Shunsuke Mitsui (UT) def. #95 Francois Musitelli (UK) 4-6, 6-3, 7-6(5)
5. #84 Joshua Lapadat (UK) def. Angel Diaz (UT) 4-6, 6-1, 6-4
6. JJ Mercer (UK) def. Conor Gannon (UT) 6-3, 6-2

Order of Finish: (2,3,4,1,6,5)