USC clinches second straight Pac-12 title against ASU

USC successfully began their postseason in San Diego at the Barnes Tennis Center by winning the Pac-12 Team Tournament over the weekend. 

The No. 13 USC Men’s Tennis team earned their fifth Pac-12 tournament title in program history, their first since 2019. Because of the pandemic and the subsequent cancellation of last year’s tournament, this weekend’s victory essentially meant back-to-back conference titles for the Trojans. 

USC was the third seed in the tournament and kicked things off by playing against the sixth-seed Oregon Ducks. The Trojans previously played the Ducks on April 3 when they easily won 5-2. Similar to this previous matchup, USC was able to beat Oregon once again in the quarterfinals with a 4-1 victory. 

In doubles play, the No. 14 duo of senior Daniel Cuckierman and redshirt senior Riley Smith beat the No. 42 Ducks partnership of junior Joshua Charlton and freshman Quinn Vandecasteele in a close 6-4 win. 

Afterwards, the No. 82 doubles team of sophomore Stefan Dostanic and junior Bradley Frye clinched the doubles point in a 6-3 win against Oregon’s senior Emmanuel Coste and sophomore Klöv-Nilsson.

Heading into singles, all Trojans were able to secure wins except for Frye, who lost to Klöv-Nilsson in straight sets, 3-6, 2-6. 

USC then had the chance to avenge their early-season loss against No. 24 Arizona. The Wildcats were a two-seed in the tournament and had beaten Utah in the quarterfinals.

Once again, the duos of Cuckierman and Smith and Dostanic and Fry were able to win their doubles matches to get the Trojans their doubles point. Then, in singles, Cukierman was able to easily upset No. 26 freshman Gustaf Strom, 6-1, 6-2. 

However, the singles matches started to get tense for the Trojans against Arizona senior Carlos Hassey beating junior Jake Sands, 1-6, 6-7. With this loss, the score became 2-1 in singles play. 

Nevertheless, Dostanic and Frye were able to win their respective singles matches in three sets to get the team the 4-1 win.  

The Trojans went on to face the other Arizona school, the fifth-seeded Arizona State Sun Devils, who previously upset both No. 4 UCLA and top-ranked Stanford. 

Back in late March, USC was able to easily beat the Sun Devils down in Tempe with a 6-1 win. 

This time around, Arizona State was looking to pull off their third upset of the tournament. After the match got delayed from 3 p.m. to 6:30 p.m. because of rain, the final match started with doubles. Despite their efforts, the Trojans ultimately lost the doubles point, 1-2, giving the Sun Devils a 1-0 lead going into singles. 

During singles play, the Trojans persevered as Frye, Sands and freshman Lodewijk Weststrate all won their matches in straight sets, giving USC a 3-1 advantage.

While Cukeriman and Smith played close matches against seniors Nathan Ponwith and Makey Rakotomalala, respectively, on court 3, Dostanic had the opportunity to seal up a victory against senior Tim Ruehl. After swiftly winning the first set 6-3, Dostanic tightly won in the second set 7-5, giving the Trojans the victory and their fifth Pac-12 title. 

As the Trojans celebrated their Pac-12 title defense, head coach Brett Masi was ecstatic about the win and the team’s singles comeback. 

“We knew that we were going to get [Arizona State’s] best go at us, and they came out and they were swinging away in doubles. I think when we settled in, I think our level was better than theirs but also just our conditioning,” Masi said. “Our three through six [positions Dostanic, Frye, Sands, and Westrate] did it for us and we didn’t rely on our two senior captains [Cuckierman and Smith].”

After getting the automatic bid to the NCAA tournament, the Trojans will wait until May 3 to hear their tournament-seeding and will head to the UTSA National Campus in Orlando, Fla. for the tournament, which will take place from May 16-28.