Florida State hosted its Invitational tennis meet Saturday, and played host to University of Alabama at Birmingham, University of Central Florida and FAMU.
The Rattlers came up short, losing to FSU and UCF in doubles and singles match play.
The Rattlers’ first matches of the day were against FSU. The Rattlers came within two serves of pulling out a victory against the 50th ranked Seminoles, but choked.
“We should have won. We served for the match twice, but then I think we got tight,” said senior Noel Wadawa.
The Rattlers lost the doubles portion of the match 1-0, and then the singles portion 4-0.
After an afternoon break, the Rattlers came back to face the UCF Golden Knights. The Knights came into the meet ranked 55th in the nation.
The Rattlers and Knights split two of the three doubles matches. In the third and final match the Knights pulled out the deciding victory during a tie breaker.
According to junior Zurab Zhvania, the Rattlers just lost concentration as UCF won the doubles matches.
Concentration wasn’t a problem for Zhvania in his singles match, winning in straight sets 7-5, 6-3. Wadawa also won his singles match in straight sets 6-2, 6-3. UCF won the remaining four matches, defeating FAMU 4-2.
“We played two highly ranked teams today and they played like it,” said head coach Latrone Mason. “We lost both matches, but I thought our guys played well enough to win.”
The Rattlers came into this meet intending on raising their RPI ranking by taking on two highly ranked teams.
0They are hoping to climb back into the top 75 to become better prepared for the Mid-Eastern Athletic Tournament in February and the NCAA tournament in May.
On Tuesday the men’s tennis team will travel to Tampa to take on the University of South Florida.