Purdue made the Gators earn their doubles point on Sunday morning.
On Courts 1 and 2, Florida was in the midst of a tiebreaker. Josh Goodger and Duarte Vale found themselves trailing halfway through the match on Court 3. Goodger and Vale stormed back to win the first match in doubles. Then, UF had to win just one tiebreaker to clinch the doubles point.
Oliver Crawford and Sam Riffice went back and forth with Athell Bennett and Julian Saborio on Court 1 in their tiebreaker. Will Grant and Johannes Ingildsen sealed the doubles victory on Court 2 and prevented UF from dropping its first doubles point this season.
The No. 3 Gators (9-1) cruised through singles play after a nerve-wracking doubles finish to take the 6-1 victory over the Boilermakers (6-4) on Sunday morning at the Schwartz Tennis Center in West Lafayette, Indiana.
In doubles, juniors Goodger and Vale knocked off Sebastian Welch and Tomasz Dudek 6-4. No. 24 senior Ingildsen and Grant, a freshman, beat Michal Wozniak and Mateo Julio 7-5 in the tiebreaker to win doubles 7-6.
Florida headed into singles play with a 1-0 advantage for the 10th time this season.
Coach Bryan Shelton refreshed his lineup against Purdue. He elected to sit junior Crawford and Ingildsen to improve his team’s depth. In their place, he substituted Goodger and No. 112 freshman Blaise Bicknell.
“We’re deep,” Shelton said after his team defeated USF on Jan. 26. “We got 12 guys on this team, and I feel comfortable putting a lot of them out there in big-time situations for us.”
Against Purdue, UF’s bench showed Shelton that it could be trusted when called upon.
Goodger was placed on Court 4 and beat Maksymillian Raupuk in straight sets 6-4, 6-4. Next, Bicknell topped Julian Saborio 6-2, 6-1 on Court 6.
No. 11 Vale finished first in singles, winning 6-2, 6-1 on Court 2 over Julio.
After Bicknell finished second, junior Andy Andrade prevailed over Wozniak 6-3, 6-4 on Court 3 to give the Gators the 4-0 lead.
Purdue broke up the shutout when No. 30 Bennett came out on top in the third set over No. 4 Riffice 2-6, 7-5, 10-8 on Court 1.
Finally, No. 90 Lukas Greif trounced Welch 6-2, 6-2 to bring the final score to 6-1.
Florida returns to action this weekend when it takes part in the Intercollegiate Tennis Association National Team Indoors Championships in Madison, Wisconsin.
“Our team competed very well this weekend,” Shelton said in a release. “Purdue applied a lot of pressure in the doubles and we answered the questions they posed very well today. Our competitive spirit was really good. We didn’t always play our best tennis throughout the weekend, but we are learning more about ourselves and we will continue to improve.”
Follow Zachary on Twitter @zacharyahuber and contact him at zhuber@alligator.org.
Oliver Crawford
