Florida Drops Heartbreaker to Pepperdine in NCAA Tournament First Round

Friday, May 8

Winston-Salem, NC

12:00 PM

Florida Gators

#39 Pepperdine (NCAA 1R)

Florida Drops Heartbreaker to Pepperdine in NCAA Tournament First Round

Friday, May 8, 2015 | Men's Tennis

NCAA Tournament Bracket: Interactive | Printable
NCAA Tournament Central Page: http://go.wfu.edu/2ks

WINSTON-SALEM, N.C. – The University of Florida men's tennis team had a dominant doubles performance and some solid singles play, but it wasn't enough as Pepperdine downed the Gators, 4-3, on Friday afternoon in the first round of the NCAA Tournament. Today's match was held at the Wake Forest Tennis Complex on the campus of Wake Forest University.

UF took the lead early with excellent doubles play, as the nation's No. 35 tandem of sophomores Maxx Lipman and Elliott Orkin won their match at the No. 1 spot over Pepperdine's Guiherme Hadlich and Rakshay Thakker, 8-2. Redshirt freshman Josh Wardell and freshman Chase Perez-Blanco then clinched the doubles point for Florida by downing PU's Stefan Menichella and Tom Hill in the No. 3 match, 8-5.

In singles, Lipman made quick work of Pepperdine's Lautaro Pane in straight sets (6-0, 6-0) in the No. 5 match. In the No. 2 spot, Orkin grabbed his team-leading 27th win as he beat Thakker, 6-4, 6-3.

Despite their great play, the Waves wouldn't go away as they won at the No. 1, 3, 4 and 6 singles spots to win the match.

Florida finishes the team portion of its season with a 14-9 mark, while having three student-athletes earn Southeastern Conference accolades. Diego Hidalgo was named First Team All-SEC while Orkin was named Second Team All-SEC. In addition, Chase Perez-Blanco earned SEC All-Freshman honors.

Despite today's loss, the Gators season isn't over as the men's and women's NCAA Singles & Doubles Championships still have yet to be played. Those matches will run from May 20-25 in Waco, Texas at Baylor University.

The participants will include the top 64 singles players and 32-doubles pairs.

2015 University of Florida Men's Tennis
Wake Forest Tennis Complex
Winston-Salem, North Carolina
Friday, May 8, 2015

Doubles	FLORIDA	vs	PEPPERDINE	Winner	Score/match length
	Maxx Lipman (35)		Guiherme Hadlich
No. 1 -	Elliott Orkin (35)		Rakshay Thakker	UF	8-2
	Diego Hidalgo (55)		Lautaro Pane
No. 2 -	Gordon Watson (55)		Pedro Iamachkine	DNF	6-3
	Chase Perez-Blanco		Stefan Menichella
No. 3 -	Joshua Wardell		Tom Hill	UF	8-5*

Singles	FLORIDA	vs	PEPPERDINE	Winner	Score/match length
No. 1 -	Diego Hidalgo (63)		Guiherme Hadlich	PU	3-6, 6-4, 6-2
No. 2 -	Elliott Orkin		Rakshay Thakker	UF	6-4, 6-3
No. 3 -	Gordon Watson		Stefan Menichella	PU*	7-6, 7-6
No. 4 -	Chase Perez-Blanco		Pedro Iamachkine	PU	6-3, 7-5
No. 5 -	Maxx Lipman (102)		Lautaro Pane	UF	6-0, 6-0
No. 6 -	Jordan Belga		Tom Hill	PU	6-0, 6-3

FINAL SCORE:	Florida – 3		Pepperdine – 4		* Clinched victory
Records:	Florida 14-9		Pepperdine 18-9
Order of Finish:	Doubles: 1, 3*		Singles: 5, 6, 2, 4, 1, 3*
Attendance: NA

Quotes from the Match

Shelton's Notes – Head Coach Bryan Shelton
On today's match…
“We showed that we weren't quite tough enough today. We certainly got off to a good start all over the place. We played pretty well in the doubles on all three courts, again. That's something that we have done well in the ladder stages of the season. But we are just putting ourselves in situations where we are up in a match and we're ready to close the door, but for whatever reason we're balking as a team. Too many of our guys are up break points consistently and we're missing the return of a serve or just making unforced errors on those points. When we do that, we're not even able to see what the other guy can do. I think that was the biggest thing today. When we had the momentum and lost it, we didn't respond. And you have to respond. The other team is going to make a push, it's the NCAA Championships. I'm just really disappointed that we didn't respond better and believe in ourselves in those moments when we had chances to close the door.”

On what UF needs to improve upon going into next season…
“We have to be physically and mentally tougher. We have to find ways to ramp up the pressure each day so that we can develop more in those areas. We're hitting the ball well as our serving, returning and volleying is all better as a team. I think our real weakness this year is that we weren't mentally tough enough. We just didn't play with enough conviction and confidence in the key moments of matches. So that's an area that we have to improve upon. Also, we have some guys that have to just get physically tougher as some of them are still boys out there. We wilted in a couple of matches today. So we just have to get them in the gym and get them in better shape.”

Florida vs. Pepperdine:
UF is now 3-5 all-time against PU.

Leading the Way:
Sophomore Elliott Orkin paced the Gators in singles as he recorded his team-leading 27th victory of the season. His classmate Maxx Lipman improved to 17-15 overall.

It Takes Two:
No. 35 Maxx Lipman and Elliott Orkin won the No. 1 doubles match easily, as they downed Pepperdine's duo, 8-2.

Prior to today's match, the Gator tandem had defeated three-straight ranked opponents as they beat Mississippi State's then No. 7-ranked Florian Lakat and Julian Cash, 6-3, Kentucky's then-No. 69-ranked Jerry Lopez and Nils Ellefsen and Tennessee's then-No. 3 pairing of Mikelis Libietis and Hunter Reese.