In one of the longest matches of the season, the Ball State Cardinals and Louisville Cardinals faced off at Cardinal Creek Tennis Center. Four hours and a number of ruffled feathers later, Louisville came out on top 4-3.
"It was a good, intense college match," BSU coach Bill Richards said.
Ball State (16-7) started things out well, taking the doubles point from Louisville (19-8). The No. 25 duo of Matt Baccarani and Patrick Thompson defeated No. 29 Jakob Gustafsson and Jeremy Clark 8-5. The other two doubles matches went into a tiebreaker, with Matt Laramore and Brad Rhodes defeating Louisville's Slavko Rodman and Johnny Berrido 9-8, while BSU's Klint Knable and Paul Newman fell 9-8 to Damar Johnson and Mark Kennedy.
In singles the Cardinals got off to a strong start but could not keep the momentum going. Thompson fell in straight sets to Clark (6-4, 6-0) while Tony Epkey also sat early (6-4, 6-0) against Gustafsson.
"There were certain matches -- Epkey, Thompson, Baccarani -- that whole side seemed like everybody hit a dead spot at the same time," Richards said. "And [Louisville] kind of pulled away."
"When you're playing someone like that, to give yourself the best opportunity to pull off the upset you really can't get blown out in any of those matches, and we got beat pretty bad in two of those matches."
Newman, meanwhile, had his way with Octavian Nicodim, winning 6-2, 6-2, tying the score at 2-2.
That left Laramore, Baccarani and Knable on the court with the match on their shoulders. Baccarani had dropped his first set 6-3 and was down 3-0 in the second set, while Laramore had also dropped his first set but ran through his opponent to win the second set 6-1. Knable won the first set 6-4 and was battling point for point with Berrido.
Laramore was the first done, falling to No. 74 Johnson 6-3, 1-6, 6-2. Then Klint Knable, who could not convert a tiebreaker in the second set, fell in the third to Berrido (4-6, 7-6, 6-2) to give Louisville its fourth point and the win.
"You can always look back and say 'What if we'd won that second setbreaker,'" Richards said of Knable. "But he at least gave himself a chance, and that's really all you can ask for.
"We lost two matches in three sets. If you turn one of those around and you win. But that's why they're a good team."
Baccarani made a gallant comeback to defeat Rodman 3-6, 6-4, 6-4.
The loss was just Ball State's second at home. The Cardinals head to Notre Dame on Saturday for their final non-conference game of the season before returning home for two matches to close the Mid-American Conference season.
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