Oct. 7, 2011
TULSA, Okla. -
Tuomas Manner and Alexander Pelaez competed in the consolation round of the ITA All-American Tournament on Friday at the Michael D. Case Tennis Center in Tulsa, Okla. Manner and Pelaez were defeated by Baylor.
Baylor's Roberto Maytin and Marko Krickovic beat Manner and Pelaez, 9-7. Maytin and Krickovic are nationally ranked 23 in doubles play.
Head Coach Cris James believes playing against strong competition is always a great opportunity.
"Anybody that we play at this stage is going to be highly ranked," said James. "The good thing is that highly ranked teams can expose weaknesses in our play that we might not have been able to see playing a less advanced team. It was a pretty close match. We were even with them all the way until the end but when we lost our serve at 7 serving 8, we just couldn't get it done."
James was impressed with Pelaez and Manner's ability to put Thursday's loss behind them.
"We played better on Friday than we did on Thursday," said James. "I was worried there was going to be a little bit of a let-down because of our loss on Thursday but they were able to go out there and play hard which was good to see."
Pelaez and Manner will be back in action with the rest of their team on Saturday. They Redbirds will be competing in the Illinois Challenger Pre-Qualifying Tournament in CHAMPAIGN, Ill.
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