Penzlin and Lofman Reach Doubles Quarterfinals at ITA All-American Championships – LSU

TULSA, Oklahoma. – Five members of the LSU Men’s Tennis team spent the week in Tulsa, Oklahoma, at the ITA All-American Championships. The competition began on September 21 and continued through September 29 at the Michael D. Case Tennis Center.

ITA All-America Championship

The Tigers appeared in both singles and doubles. First of all, Julien Penzlin showed an impressive performance in singles. He opened the tournament for the Tigers with a 6-3, 7-5 win against No. 98 Hugo Coquelin of Vanderbilt, continuing the main draw of the tournament. In Sunday’s contest, Penzlin faced the University of Georgia’s Freddy Blaydes. Points went back and forth in the first set and Penzlin took the first set by a narrow score of 7-5. The second set quickly went to Tiger at 6-3, allowing Penzlin to advance in the contest. After an impressive first match, Penzlin took the momentum into his second match of the day against Michigan State University’s Taym Alazmeh. Penzlin won 6-4, 6-3 and this win saw her active in the singles knockout stage. Following Penzlin’s impressive run in the competition’s main draw, No. 70 Alexander Bernard defeated him 6-3, 6-2. Penzlin defeated Miami’s number 58 player Antonio Prat in two consecutive sets, 6-4 and 6-1, in the singles consolation matches.

Rudy Ceccon lost to UNC Chapel Hill’s Anthony Wright in the singles qualifying match with sets of 6-3, 6-1. However, Ceccon won the consolation match against Duke University’s Jake Krug, defeating Krug 6-4, 7-5.

Also in action, Ishaan Ravichander faced No. 71 Aidan Kim of Ohio State. Kim defeated Ravichander in the singles elimination match with scores of 6-1, 6-0. Ravichander returns to action in Tuesday’s consolation singles match, facing UNC Chapel Hill’s Constantinos Djakouris. Djakouris narrowly won the first set with a score of 6-4. The second set was followed by a fight in which Djakouris won 6-3 and ended the match.

The Tigers opened doubles play on Tuesday with No. 20 Penzlin and Lofman hitting the court together. Initially, the Tiger duo faced the No. 8 Old Dominion duo of Connor Henry Van Schalkwyk and Codie Schalk Van Schalkwyk. The first set quickly went to the Tigers’ lead by a score of 6-3. The tie was broken in the second set and Penzlin and Lofman won 7-6(4) and took the Tigers to the next round. Back on the field, Penzlin and Lofman faced the No. 11 duo of Brigham Young University’s Wally Thayne and Zach Fuchs. Thayne and Fuchs won the first set with a score of 6-3. Despite losing the first set, the Tiger duo fought back and won the second set 7-6(2) in a tiebreak. Carrying their momentum from the second set to the third and final set, Penzlin and Lofman won the match by two points with a score of 11-9 and advanced to the quarter-finals. In the quarterfinal competition, Penzlin and Lofman faced Hugo Hashimoto and Columbia’s Michael Zheng. While the first set witnessed a tough fight, the Lions won 7-5. The second set ended with Hashimoto and Zheng leading 6-1.

Next
Three Tigers will compete in the UTR PTT 25K Boca Raton from September 29 to October 5.

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