PROVO, Utah—Behind Andrey Goryachkov’s strong performance in singles and doubles play, the No. 58 BYU men’s tennis team defeated No. 72 Portland 5-2 at home Friday night.
“We knew that Portland was a very good team, so we had to be prepared for the match tonight,” BYU head coach Brad Pearce said. “Portland competed well and they are a good team, but I was really proud of our guys. They stepped up and took care of business.”
Goryachkov and partner Keaton Cullimore secured the doubles point with a 6-4 win over Portland’s Pierre Garcia and Alex Wallace. Prior to their win, BYU’s Jacob Sullivan and John Pearce defeated the Pilots' Kent Andereasen and Felix Fan, 6-3. Jeremy Bourgeois and Aidan Carrazedo’s match was suspended at 4-5, as BYU (10-1, 1-0 WCC) had already won the doubles point.
On the singles side, Goryachkov won the first singles point for the Cougars, defeating Pierre Garcia 6-4, 6-4. Although Sullivan dropped his match to Wallace shortly after, Shane Monroe claimed another point for the Cougars, beating Portland’s Mike Pervolarakis 6-4, 6-4, to put BYU up 3-1 in the match.
After Cullimore dropped his match, Pearce closed out his match against the Pilots' Jared Madison, 6-2, 6-2, to clinch the match for the Cougars. Bourgeois defeated Fan moments later to end the match at 5-2 in favor of BYU.
The Cougars’ second match of the weekend will be against Gonzaga tomorrow at 2:00 p.m. MST. Fans can follow the action live by clicking here.