The formidable No. 5 NC State men’s tennis began a four-match road trip with a pair of wins over ACC opponents. The Wolfpack beat Louisville in Kentucky on Friday afternoon in a dominant 4-0 sweep over the Cardinals while sneaking past the Fighting Irish in a close 4-3 win over Notre Dame in South Bend, Indiana.

The two wins pushed the red-and-white’s win streak to nine straight victories.

At Louisville, 4-0 win

NC State’s trip to Louisville was a smooth one. The Wolfpack won an uneventful doubles round while taking the three singles matches it needed with minimal losses.

The Pack started doubles with a win on Court 2 from redshirt freshman Jules Leroux and senior Luca Staeheli, who beat their opponents 6-3. The No. 9 pair of seniors Braden Shick and Fons Van Sambeek won by the same score, setting down their opponents easily to secure the doubles point for NC State.

Leroux notched a win in the singles round as well, claiming the first singles point of the day for the Pack in a 6-0, 6-3 win on Court 5.

To put the Pack in a clinching position, redshirt freshman William Manning beat his Cardinal opponent on Court 6. While Manning narrowly edged out his opponent 7-5 in his first set, he cruised through his second for a 6-0 win.

No. 26 Shick finished off the Cardinals with a 6-1, 6-4 win on Court 1 that left the three remaining matches on Courts 2, 3 and 4 unfinished. Shick’s two-set victory sealed the Pack’s 4-0 sweep in Kentucky over Louisville.

At Notre Dame, 4-3 win

NC State survived a major upset at the hands of the Fighting Irish in South Bend on Sunday afternoon. After winning the early doubles point, Notre Dame gave all it had in singles, setting down three NC State players before Leroux finished off the hosts on the final court of the bout.

The Wolfpack won a close doubles point thanks to a round clinched by a tiebreak win on Court 2 from Staeheli and Leroux. The pair beat Notre Dame’s No. 23 pair of Jameson Corsillo and Yu Zhang 7-6 (7-2) to decide the round.

To set up Staeheli and Leroux for the win, the No. 9 pair of Van Sambeek and Shick beat their opponents 6-2 while freshman Nikolay Nedelchev and Manning narrowly fell to the Irish on Court 3.

Leading 1-0 heading into singles, NC State doubled its lead with a 6-3, 6-0 win from Van Sambeek on Court 4. From there, the two sides exchanged wins — Notre Dame’s No. 34 Sebastian Dominko downed Shick 6-4, 7-6 (7-0) while the Pack responded with a win from No. 23 Borisiouk on Court 2.

Notre Dame once again fought back, this time with a win from Zhang on Court 3 over Staeheli in straight sets. The Fighting Irish finally drew level with a win on Court 6 over Manning in three sets. With the upset on the line on Court 5 between Leroux and the hosts’ Luis Llorens Saracho, Leroux clinched the Pack’s ninth-straight win with a 6-4, 4-6, 6-2 win.

NC State will remain on the road for a match with Georgia Tech Friday. Play against the Yellow Jackets is set for 5 p.m. in Atlanta.