By Jesse Dimich-Louvet, OwlSports Update
Temple battled, clawed, and rallied but to no avail. After three hours of grueling play, there was little to show for it. The Owls lost 6-1 against the UPenn Quakers at the Hecht Tennis Center in a fairly comprehensible fashion on Wednesday night. Temple began by dropping all three of its doubles matches despite a pair of near comebacks from the number one and three pairings of Delmas/Gorregues and Grollman/Barety losing 7-5 and 6-4, respectively. In singles, junior and Owls number one Marin Delmas was topped in a 6-4, 6-3 loss against Italian Edoardo Graziania. Leo Raquin was unable to do much more against German number two Jason Hildebrandt losing 6-2, 6-4. The Owls looked sluggish in the opening stanza of the singles. “We need more energy moving into the singles as we started off a little slow.” Head Coach Steve Mauro said. However, the clash of the night was a gritty affair between Gregoire Barety and Aditya Gupta. Following two one-sided sets 6-2 and 1-6, the match was destined to go the distance. With lung-busting rallies and Barety sliding on the hardcourt as if it were clay, the match had all the drama one could ask for. It was just not meant to be for the Owls. Barety lost a nail biter 7-5 in the third set, cementing UPenn's victory. The lone Owls victory came from number five senior Louis Gorregues who claimed an impressive 7-6, 2-6, 10-8 win over Zach Smith. Senior Thibault Frumholz and newcomer Hussein El Tawil also fell in straight sets. In his 17th year at the helm of the men’s and women’s programs, Coach Mauro was not overly upset with how the night went. “Look, they are a top 30 team, so we know it would be tough,” Mauro exclaimed. “The guys fought hard and we need to keep working hard to get better and be ready against Yale.” That match against Yale was postponed on Friday thanks to the winter storm. Temple is back on the court at home on February 5th versus St. Francis College of Brooklyn.
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AuthorJesse Dimich-Louvet, OwlSports Update Archives
May 2022
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