WACO, Texas – "The team of destiny keeps on destiny-ing!" Those were the words of Cracked Racquets broadcaster Alex Gruskin as the ninth-ranked Toreros topped No. 7 Duke 4-3 to remain undefeated on the season and advance to the ITA National Team Indoor Championships quarterfinals Friday.
"Another match that will go down in the memory books," USD Head Coach
Ryan Keckley said. "An instant classic. You can't script this stuff, as this match had as much drama as you could possibly ask for. But that's the kind of season we have had."
The match will go down in the history books too as the tournament five seed Toreros, off to a program-best start at 8-0, collect a fifth win over a top-25 opponent, third win by a 4-3 score and first advancement to the ITA Indoors quarterfinals in program history. Freshman
Adrien Berrut was the hero this time out. The Switzerland native clinched the match in a wild 7-5, 6-7 (5-7), 7-5 match that ended on back-to-back overruled line calls.
The Toreros will take on defending national champions and top-ranked TCU on Saturday at 1:30 p.m. PT, streaming live on the Cracked Racquets YouTube.
San Diego brought the energy early and dominated the doubles point at the corners as the national No. 1 duo of
Stian Klaassen and
Oliver Tarvet as well as the pairing of Berrut and redshirt-junior
Nikhil Niranjan both jumped out to 5-0 leads. They would go on to win 6-1 and 6-3 respectively.
In singles play, it was senior
Iiro Vasa who doubled the Torero lead, claiming a 6-2, 6-3 straight-set victory on court three. The Blue Devils bounced back, however, claiming straight set wins at courts six and two.
On courts one and four, Tarvet and Klaassen were both serving to win their matches and clinch, but only the second-ranked Tarvet could pull through, a 6-2, 6-4 win over one of last season's top players, current No. 58 Cooper Williams.
It was then, with a 3-2 lead, that the tide turned for the T-Ros. Klaassen, serving for his match at 6-3, 3-6, 5-3, lost four straight games for Duke to knot the match at three apiece.
On the last remaining court, after winning the first set 7-5, Berrut was ahead 5-4 in the second and later 5-0 in the 6-6 tiebreak before losing seven straight points to even the match at one set apiece.
In the third set, Berrut and his Blue Devil counterpart Gerard Planelles Ripoll held serves until Ripoll took first advantage at 4-3. The freshman broke back and broke again at 6-5 to clinch the match. The match was decided by back-to-back electronic line system challenges in Berrut's favor as the Toreros stormed the court.
"So proud of Adrien for handling the last-match-on moment," said Keckley. "It's not easy for a freshman to be put in that position. He showed up when the team needed him most. He'll remember that moment forever."
"I'm also very proud of how we kept fighting and kept believing with all the adversity we faced down the stretch. We did a great job capturing the momentum in both doubles and singles, but we have to learn to capitalize when the moment presents itself. Credit to Duke, they deserved to win that match for how they fought back. Duke is a very good team and we knew it would be a 4 hour war with them."
Results
[5] #9 San Diego 4, [4] #7 Duke 3
Doubles
- #1 Stian Klaassen/Oliver Tarvet (USD) def. Pedro Rodenas/Theo Winegar (DU), 6-1
- #63 Andreja Petrovic/Cooper Williams (DU) def. Iiro Vasa/Savriyan Danilov (USD), 6-3
- Adrien Berrut/Nikhil Niranjan (USD) def. Connor Krug/Teddy Truwit (DU), 6-3
Singles
- #2 Oliver Tarvet (USD) def. #58 Cooper Williams (DU), 6-2, 6-4
- #39 Pedro Rodenas (DU) def. #34 Savriyan Danilov (USD), 6-2, 6-2
- Iiro Vasa (USD) def. Andreja Petrovic (DU), 6-2, 6-3
- Connor Krug (DU) def. #94 Stian Klaassen (USD), 3-6, 6-3, 7-5
- Adrien Berrut (USD) def. Gerard Planelles Ripoll (DU), 7-5, 6-7 (5-7), 7-5
- Remy Dugardin (DU) def. Neo Niedner (USD), 6-2, 6-0
Order of Finish – Doubles: 2,1, 3; Singles: 3, 6, 2, 1, 4, 5
