The NC State men’s tennis team competed in the ITA Carolina Regional Friday through Tuesday at the Cary Tennis Park. This tournament featured single and doubles matches with 24 schools from North and South Carolina participating at the event in Cary.
Seven Wolfpack players saw action in singles matches to start out the events on Friday. Of those, junior twin brothers Igor and Ivan Saveljic and junior Georgiy Malyshev, who was No. 25 in the singles draw, advanced to the round of 32 with two match wins each.
The twins continued to excel in singles play as both made the round of 16. Igor Saveljic notched his first career victory against a top-30 opponent on Sunday, advancing to the quarterfinal round. He defeated No. 28 Gabriel Friedrich of South Carolina who was also the tournament’s No. 2 seed. Once in the singles quarterfinals, Igor fell 7-6 (3), 6-3 to UNC-Asheville’s Henry Patten.
Four doubles teams also represented NC State in Cary, with the tandem of redshirt junior Michael Ogden and sophomore Alexis Galarneau earning the No. 1 seed of the draw as doubles started Saturday afternoon.
Coming in ranked at No. 14, Ogden and Galarneau got their first doubles victory of the season in the first round against East Carolina, and later advanced to the quarterfinals. In the midst of their great singles play, Igor and Ivan Saveljic also impressed as doubles partners as they advanced to the round of 16 where they were edged 6-3, 6-4 by Winthrop’s Diego Quiroz and Ruy Teixeira.
On Sunday’s quarterfinal match against South Carolina’s Wood Benton and Yancy Dennis, Ogden and Galarneau took a loss in the first set but bounced back to win the second and third sets to move on to Tuesday’s semifinal.
All four teams in the semifinals were from the ACC as Wake Forest took on Clemson and Ogden and Galarneau challenged Duke. The Wolfpack’s marquee doubles pair became NC State’s fourth team to make the ITA Carolina Regional doubles championship round in the last five years by besting Sean Sculley and Nick Stachowiak of Duke in three sets.
Ogden and Galarneau reached the finals against Wake Forest’s redshirt senior Christian Seraphim and redshirt junior Julian Zlobinksy who advanced on a walkover. The fresh Demon Deacons lost 6-2 in the first set but forced a tiebreaker after a 6-3 second frame. It was all Wake Forest from there as they bested Ogden and Galarneau 1-0 to win the doubles title.
“Being able to do that at a high level with a very strong field here at the tournament was great,” head coach Kyle Spencer said to NC State Athletics. “The super positive energy that [Ogden and Galarneau] brought to each match was awesome, and it was a good benchmark for our team moving forward.”
Pack men’s tennis will continue its fall schedule when they travel to Charlotte to participate in the Charlotte 49ers Fall Invitational on Oct. 27-29.
