Just one day removed from seeing its basketball team demoralized at the hands of the Tar Heels, the top-ranked Virginia men’s tennis team handed No. 5 UNC a demoralizing loss of its own in Sunday’s ITA National Indoor Semifinals.
The Cavaliers–playing at home in Charlottesville–made quick work of the Tar Heels, with the scoreboard at Boar’s Head Sports Club showing a 4-0 clean sweep.
UNC previously defeated a pair of top 10 teams–No. 10 Georgia and No. 4 Cal–in the tournament’s first two rounds, but on Sunday it found out exactly why Virginia has been ranked No. 1 all year.
The Tar Heels (11-1) dropped the doubles point for the third consecutive match–only this time they weren’t able to make up for it in singles competition, causing the team to suffer its first loss of the season.
Virginia’s Collin Altamirano defeated UNC’s top player–Ronnie Schneider, ranked No. 16 in the nation–with ease, knocking him off in straight sets by a score of 6-0, 6-3.
Jack Murray and Simon Soendergaard also lost in straight sets for UNC, which failed to win any sets at all in what was a rematch of last year’s ITA National Final–a match won by the Tar Heels.
After failing to defend their championship this year, the next step for head coach Sam Paul and his team to get back on track is a road match against unranked Vanderbilt on Monday, Feb. 27 at 2 p.m.
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