NCAA tournament ends for UNC individuals

The North Carolina men’s and women’s tennis players competing in the NCAA singles and doubles championships all fell early last week at the Dan Magill Tennis Complex in Athens, Ga.

In fact, only one Tar Heel survived the first round.

After knocking off Tulsa’s Ashley Watling in two sets Wednesday, UNC junior Jose Hernandez found himself on the verge of a trip to the round of 16 in Thursday’s second-round match against Nik Scholtz from Ole Miss.

Hernandez won the first set 6-3 and led 4-1 in the second-set tiebreaker.

But Scholtz rallied to win the tiebreaker, seized the momentum and took control of the match. His energy drained, Hernandez dropped the last set 6-2.

“He certainly had a lot of opportunities,” coach Sam Paul said. “It was a heartbreaking loss to be so close and be in control, but give the other kid credit — he stepped his game up when he needed to.”

Just hours later, Hernandez took the court again with doubles partner Joey Burkhardt to take on No. 1 seed and eventual champion Ohio State. The Tar Heels gave the Buckeyes their toughest test of the tournament, but fell 7-6, 7-6.

On the women’s side, both Zoe De Bruycker and Lauren McHale lost in the first round to opponents from Baylor.

After dropping the first set, De Bruycker bounced back to win the second and came within one game of victory in the third set.

“Zoe was down a set and did a really good job of getting herself back in the match,” coach Brian Kalbas said.

“Unfortunately she made some unforced errors at the wrong time and allowed the girl to seize the momentum.”

Still bothered by a nagging foot injury, McHale fell in two sets while struggling to keep up with her opponent’s pace and power.

“She couldn’t prepare the way she needed to leading up to it. She couldn’t play practice sessions and she couldn’t be out there training as much as she needed,” Kalbas said.

McHale admitted that the nerves associated with playing in her first NCAA tournament may have affected her play. The foot problems only made things worse.

“I’ve been off for a month now,” she said. “And it shot my confidence always thinking about it. But I tried to put it aside and not think about it too much during the match.”

McHale and doubles partner Shinann Featherston in a first-round match Thursday against Natalie Pluskota and Kata Szekely of Tennessee. UNC fell 7-6, 6-3.

Although the match was an upset on paper, Kalbas thought the Tar Heels’ opponents were much better than their seeding indicated.

“That team is very, very good,” Kalbas said.

“I knew when I saw the draw that we were in for a very difficult match.”

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