Men's tennis head coach Bill Richards called Wednesday's match with No. 42 Indiana a tough one.
Indiana (9-1) won 4-3, dropping the Cardinals overall record to 7-3. The loss also snapped the team's five-game win-streak.
No. 60 Ball State started strong by winning the doubles point, sweeping the three matches.
Richards said after winning the doubles point in such a convincing fashion the Cardinals should have continued that surge into singles.
"I didn't feel like we really carried over quite as much momentum into singles as we needed to," he said. "I told our guys they (the other teams) weren't going to go away quietly just because they lost the doubles point."
The Cardinals lost four of the six singles matches, losing the match overall. Senior Kevin Burnett won 7-6 (4), 5-7, (11-9) and freshman Patrick Thompson won 5-7, 7-6 (4), (11-9).
Ball State's top two singles players, senior Chris Varga and freshman Matt Baccarani, failed to win. The loss drops Varga's singles record to 7-3 in the No. 1 position.
Richards said he thought the team missed opportunities in some of the singles matches.
"I thought (Varga) had chances to take charge in the first set and didn't," Richards said. "Baccarani lost at two, and he had chances to close his match out and didn't.
"We had them backed into a corner, I thought, and then we just let them off a little easy, but a lot of that is to their credit. They're a good team, and they didn't buckle when they could have."
Regarding the close loss, Richards said the team let a big opportunity slip away.
"I am not saying it's a match we should have won, but I think it's a match we could have won," he said. "If you're going to take that step we talked about you need to take advantage of those opportunities, and we let an opportunity get away today."
Read More
Three Air Jam teams take home the win
October 12, 2012Nineteen teams shimmied, shook and flipped for a sold out John R. Emens Auditorium on Thursday night during the 25th annual Air Jam.
Bill Clinton Speaks at North Central High School
October 12, 2012Former President's Speech Could Have Effect on State Senate Race
