CHICAGO – Baylor men's tennis opened consolation play at the ITA Indoor Team Championships on Saturday with a 4-0 loss to No. 8 South Carolina.
 
The Bears (5-7) lost the doubles point in a tiebreaker but were mounting a pair of singles comebacks before the Gamecocks (9-1) clinched the match.
 
THE RUNDOWN
The Bears nearly took the doubles point from a stacked South Carolina doubles lineup, which included the No. 3, No. 30 and No. 59^th-ranked teams in the nation.
 
Court Three ended first in a 6-2 decision in favor of the 59^th-ranked Casey Hoole and Raphael Lambling over Luc Koenig and Ethan Muza. Tadeas Paroulek and Zsombor Velcz held the lead in their match for a 6-4 win over No. 30 Jake Beasley and James Story. With their win, the pair picked up their second win over a nationally ranked opponent this season and improved their record to 7-1.
 
The first court in doubles saw the duo of No. 9 Finn Bass and Juan Pablo Grassi Mazzuchi come back from a 2-5 deficit to force a seven-point tiebreaker against No. 3 Connor Thomson and Toby Samuel. The Gamecocks won the breaker 7-3 to take the match and the doubles point.
 
Singles points opened with a 6-0, 6-1 win from Hoole over Koenig on Court Five. The No. 11^th player in the nation, Samuel, defeated Paroulek after a comeback to force a tiebreaker, 6-1, 7-6(3).
 
South Carolina secured its win on Court Four, where Story defeated Velcz with two 6-4 sets.
 
On the unfinished courts, the remaining Bears were putting up second set fights, as Marko Miladinović came back against the 12^th-ranked Thomson, leading 5-4 in Set Two. Court Three was also left with No. 44 Bass up over No. 67 Lambling, 5-4, in the second set.
 
QUOTABLE
Head coach Michael Woodson
On Saturday's match…
"I have to give a lot of credit to South Carolina. They had a tough match yesterday, and they really didn't let that affect them. They got on us early, but I thought we did a good job of battling back in the doubles to give ourselves a chance. We just have to keep pushing for more and holding ourselves and each other accountable, and we get the chance to compete again tomorrow."
 
WHAT'S NEXT
The Bears have one more match in Chicago and will play the loser of the North Carolina vs. Florida match Sunday morning at 9.