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The University of Mississippi Athletics
Ole Miss
Auburn
No. 13 Rebels Down Auburn 4-1
3/20/2015 | Men's Tennis
OXFORD, Miss. - The No. 13 Ole Miss men's tennis team won a key doubles point and carried the momentum to a 4-1 win against Auburn under the lights at the Palmer/Salloum Tennis Center here Friday.
With the win, the Rebels improved to 11-4 overall and 3-1 in the SEC as they get set to welcome No. 15 Florida Sunday at Noon.
"We are really proud of the guys and the way they competed out there," head coach Toby Hansson said. "We got a huge win at No. 2 doubles to get the early lead and then the guys did a tremendous job of never letting up. This was a very good Auburn team, and the guys made them play a lot of points. We never really gave them a chance to get into the match. The crowd was great and the atmosphere was fun."
Nik Scholtz and Zvonimir Babic won 6-2 at No. 1 and then Auburn took the No. 3 match 6-3. The point came down to No. 2 where Stefan Lindmark and Gustav Hansson battled Auburn's Oliver Plaskett and Petar Tomic to a tiebreaker and won it 8-6 to give Ole Miss the 1-0 lead.
The Rebels maintained their momentum in singles, winning all six first sets. Scholtz, ranked No. 23, defeated 59th-ranked Lukas Ollert 6-4, 6-3 at No. 1 singles to make it 2-0. He improved to 9-3 and has won 19 of his last 20 home matches.
Sophomore Ricardo Jorge increased the lead to 3-0 when he finished off Plaskett 6-4, 6-4 at No. 6 singles for his 17th win of the year.
Auburn got on the board, when Dante Saleh defeated Vinod Gowda in three sets, 3-6, 6-1, 6-1 at No. 5 singles.
That would be it, as Lindmark sealed the win at No. 2 singles against Max Hinnisdaels. Lindmark won the first set 6-2, but Hinnisdaels was able to break and hold for the second set 6-4. Lindmark got the early break in the third set and never looked back, winning it 6-2 to clinch the victory.
"I lost twice to this guy in the fall, but I feel like I am a much better player now than I was back then," Lindmark said. "Even though the score in the third set was 6-2 it was an extremely close match. It could have gone either way, and I am so happy that I won it for the team."
"We've improved a lot since the first time we played outside against Alabama, and that is great to see," Hansson added. "We had a great week of practice, and that showed in the match tonight. Nik played really well, Stefan stepped it up in the third set and Ricardo showed that he has improved a lot."
The Rebels will face a tough Florida team on Sunday, who comes in 4-2 in the SEC after downing Arkansas 4-0 Friday. In their first meeting back in January, Ole Miss rallied to knock off the Gators 4-3 in the first round of the ITA Kick-Off in Gainesville.
"Florida will be another huge test, much like this match against Auburn," Hansson closed. "It's going to come down to a few points here or there. We would like to see another great crowd and hopefully we can get them one more time."
For more information on Ole Miss Men's Tennis, follow the Rebels on Twitter at @OleMissMTennis, on Facebook atOleMissMTennis and on Instagram at OleMissMTennis.
Players Mentioned
