Despite late push, Hoosiers fall to Cardinals

For the second consecutive match, the Hoosiers played exceptionally well against a top-40 team.

But for the second consecutive match, the IU men’s tennis team walked away with a 4-3 loss.

The No. 41 Hoosiers could never quite get out of an early hole in singles play, as they dropped a hard-fought match to No. 15 Louisville at the IU Varsity Courts. IU was coming off a tough 4-3 loss to No. 39 Minnesota on Sunday.

The Hoosiers (12-7, 3-3) earned the doubles point for the third consecutive match. They got wins from the duo of junior Lachlan Ferguson and freshman Josh MacTaggart at No.1 (8-4) and the tandem of junior Santiago Gruter and sophomore Jeremy Langer at No. 2 (8-5).

Finding consistent singles victories, however, has been difficult.

After Louisville’s Austen Childs and Robert Hall defeated Langer and sophomore Stephen Vogl at No. 1 and No. 6 singles, respectively, the Hoosiers’ sophomore Maxime Armengaud helped keep IU alive by posting a 7-6 (7-4), 6-2 win over Andrew Carter at No. 5.

But Gruter (5-7, 6-7) and MacTaggart (4-6, 6-1, 3-6) lost close matches and the Cardinals walked away with the win.

Ferguson also earned a singles win for the Hoosiers, defeating Victor Maksimcuk 6-7 (4-7), 6-4, 10-5 at No. 2.

“I thought we played really well today,” said IU assistant coach Scott Linn. “Lachlan did a great job of closing out and Maxime being back out there competing for us is a good sign. But I think we’ve got to get one of these wins against a team ranked so high and then we’ll start winning a lot against those teams.”