Oklahoma State University Athletics
Cowboys Fight Off Red Raiders
April 17, 2004 | Cowboy Tennis
“It was really tough conditions against a good team and you knew it was going to be a battle,” head coach james Wadley said. “
The Cowboys notched the first point of the dual winning two of the three doubles' matches. Mark Van Elden and Daniel Byrnes were the first off the court after they won the final five games to defeat Jakob Paulsen and Bojan Szumanski 8-4.
Yevgen Bondarchuk and Boris Kuharic jumped out to a 5-2 lead over Dinko Halachev and Esat Tanik before holding on to win 8-6.
OSU got off to a quick start in singles getting straight set wins from Tomas Bohunicky and Daniel Byrnes to go up 3-1 in the dual after Bondarchuk lost to Szumanski in straight sets.
“I am disappointed to lose my final match at home,” Bondarchuk said. “It has been a struggle at times playing with a groin pull when I knew I could help my team, but I just was not able to do it like when we played at Texas earlier. There were times when my team was able to win without me, but now I feel better and am playing better. I wish I could have just a few more semesters to continue to play.”
The Pokes still needed to find one more point to claim the match and it would come from the most unlikely source. Juan Felipe Diaz defeated Dimitrio Martinez in straight sets to seal the match for OSU, while Van Elden and Kuharic both lost in three sets. Van Elden and Kuharic were a combined 31-3 going into the match today.
“Everytime we win we have different people come through for us,” Wadley said. “Today it was Tomas (Bohunicky), Felipe (Diaz), Daniel (Byrnes) and our doubles came through for us. I though some of our guys performed really well and I though some of them did not perform that well.”
The Cowboys return to action in a televised match against the University of Tulsa at the Michael D. Case Tennis Center on Wednesday, April 21. The match will begin at 5 p.m and will be aired by Cox Cable in Tulsa, channel 29 in Stillwater.
“The players are excited about playing on TV for the first time,” Wadley said. “If you cannot get excited about playing a tough innerstate rival on TV then there is something wrong with you. We are excited for the opportunity to play in our first televised match. Hopefully we will play well enough to win and can come out and compete hard.”
No. 29 Oklahoma State 4, No. 67 Texas Tech 3
Singles
No. 1 No. 72 Jakob Paulsen (TTU) def. No. 25 Mark Van Elden (OSU) 5-7, 6-4, 14-12
No. 2 Bojan Szumanski (TTU) def. Yevgen Bondarchuk (OSU) 6-3, 6-2
No. 3 Tomas Bohunicky (OSU) def. Esat Tanik (TTU) 6-3, 6-1
No. 4 Dinko Halachev (TTU) def. Boris Kuharic (OSU) 6-4, 1-6, 6-3
No. 5 Daniel Byrnes (OSU) def. Michael Innerebner (TTU) 6-1, 6-4
No. 6 Juan Felipe Diaz (OSU) def. Dimitrio Martinez (TTU) 6-2, 7-5
Doubles
No. 1 Kuharic/Bondarchuk (OSU) def. Halachev/Tanik (TTU) 8-6
No. 2 Van Elden/Byrnes (OSU) def. Paulsen/Szumanski (TTU) 8-4
No. 3 Diblasi/Innerebner (TTU) def. Diaz/Bohunicky (OSU) 9-8
