• Main
• Roster
• Coaches
• Schedule
• Statistics
• Archives

April 10, 2011

NORMAN, Okla. - The 26th-ranked University of Oklahoma men's tennis team defeated No. 39 Rice, 6-1, on Sunday inside the Gregg Wadley Tennis Pavilion.

The Sooners (13-4, 2-1 Big 12) have won three straight dual matches and the win marked the sixth time Roddick's squad has defeated a team by six or more points.

"It was a good match and we played really well overall," Roddick said. "We played very solid doubles and it was probably the best we have played one-through-three despite not getting the win at No. 1. Then singles was really good one-through-six. It was as good as I've seen us play as a team. It was all-in-all a really good performance today."

Against the Owls, OU won seven of nine matches with its only losses coming in tiebreaker sets at No. 1 doubles and No. 3 singles.

Oklahoma's Laurentiu Gavril and Lawrence Formentera teamed up at the No. 3 position to down Rice's Christian Saravia and Sam Garforth-Bles, 8-5.

Clinching the doubles point for the Sooners was Costin Paval and Peerakit Siributwong at the No. 2 spot. The OU duo, ranked No. 42, routed the Owls' Peter Frank and Michael Nuesslein, 8-3.

OU's only loss in doubles came at the No. 1 spot where senior Ionut Beleleu and Tsvetan Mihov dropped a tiebreaker set to Rice's Harry Fowler and Oscar Podlewski, 9-8(5).

The Sooners' Paval was the first to dispose of his opponent in singles. Paval, the 2010 Big 12 Freshman of the Year, downed Rice's Frank at the No. 2 spot, 6-1, 6-1.

Beleleu, OU's lone senior and the ITA Central Region Champion, gave OU a 3-point advantage after he routed the Owls' 97th-ranked Fowler, 6-1, 6-2. Beleleu was honored prior to the match as a distinguished senior.

Formentera clinched the match for Oklahoma after he defeated Rice's Christian Saravia in straight sets, 6-3, 6-1. The California native has now won five straight singles matches.

Gavrila put OU up 5-0 after he beat the Owls' Garthorth-Bles at the No. 4 position in identical sets, 6-3.

The next match to conclude play was at the No. 6 spot where Mihov defeated Rice's Siefert, 6-3, 6-4.

The Owls earned their only point of the match after Podlewski rallied to defeat OU's Siributwong. Siributwong rallied from four games behind to take the first set, 7-5,  but dropped the second set 6-1. In the super-tiebreaker set Siributwong came back to even the score at 9-9 after trailing 8-3, but eventually lost, 1-0(10).

Next Up, Oklahoma travels to take on a pair of Big 12 opponents in Baylor and Texas Tech on April 15 and 17, respectively.

No. 26 Oklahoma 6, No. 39 Rice 1

Doubles:
1. Fowler/Podlweski (RICE) def. Beleleu/Mihov (OU), 9-8(5)
2. #42 Paval/Siributwong (OU) def. Frank/Nuesslein (RICE), 8-3
3. Gavrila/Formentera (OU) def. Saravia/Garforth-Bles (RICE), 8-5
Order of finish: 3, 2, 1

Singles:
1. #30 Ionut Beleleu (OU) def. #97 Harry Fowler (RICE), 6-1, 6-2
2. #79 Costin Paval (OU) def. Peter Frank (RICE), 6-1, 6-1
3. Oscar Podlewski (RICE) def. Peerakit Siributwong (OU), 5-7, 6-1, 1-0(10)
4. Laurentiu Gavrila (OU) def. Sam Garthorth-Bles (RICE), 6-3, 6-3
5. Lawrence Formentera (OU) def. Christian Saravia (RICE), 6-3, 6-1
6. Tsvetan Mihov (OU) def. Philip Seifert (RICE), 6-3, 6-4
Order of finish: 2, 1, 5*, 4, 6, 3