{"id":491115,"date":"2026-02-22T01:56:08","date_gmt":"2026-02-22T01:56:08","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/491115\/"},"modified":"2026-02-22T01:56:08","modified_gmt":"2026-02-22T01:56:08","slug":"vol-tennis-falls-to-wildcats-5-2","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/491115\/","title":{"rendered":"Vol Tennis Falls To Wildcats, 5-2"},"content":{"rendered":"

LEXINGTON, Ky. — Tennessee men’s tennis team came up short at Kentucky on Saturday afternoon, falling 5-2 in the first conference match of the season.
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\nThe Big Orange struggled to find momentum in the opening sets of the match and lost the doubles point to the Cats after dropping courts two and three. Kentucky’s Martin Breysach and Charlelie Cosnet defeated Jose Garcia<\/a> and Alejandro Moreno<\/a>, 6-1. The duo of Shion Itsusaki<\/a> and Ethan Muza<\/a> fought back to even their match at 4-4, but they couldn’t get past Nicolas Arseneault and Jaden Weekes, losing 6-4.
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\nThe Vols weren’t able to find their footing following doubles and failed to capture the next two points. Jose Garcia<\/a> provided a spark with a three-set winner, coming back after losing the first set, over No. 38 Jack Loutit, 4-6, 6-4, 7-5. The Wildcats answered with the winning point on court one after No. 94 Nicolas Arseneault won over No. 58 Alejandro Moreno<\/a> in a three-set thriller, 6-0, 6-7 (7-9), 6-3.
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\nFreshman Shion Itsusaki<\/a> picked up his fourth career win in three sets to stay undefeated in singles. It was Itsusaki’s first career match that went the distance, as he bested Kentucky’s Matt Rankin, 6-2, 2-6, 10-8.
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\nUP NEXT
\nUT will close out its stretch of two away matches by competing against Vanderbilt on Monday at 2 p.m. ET at the Lummis Family Tennis Center in Nashville.
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\nSTAYING PERFECT
\nFreshman Shion Itsusaki<\/a> has been a bright spot for the Vols, starting his college career a perfect 4-0 in singles. Itsusaki has only dropped one set out of the nine he has played thus far. That’s an 89-percent winning percentage on court six for Tennessee men’s tennis.
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\nTAKING THE NEXT STEP
\nKnoxville native Jose Garcia<\/a> has truly taken the next step in his sophomore year. Garcia never saw time on singles court two in his first year, but he has gone undefeated (4-0) there this campaign. The sophomore is tied for a team-best 12 singles wins with senior Alejandro Moreno<\/a> for 2025-26.
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\nRESULTS
\nSingles<\/p>\n


\n\t#94 Nicolas Arseneault (UK) def. #58 Alejandro Moreno<\/a> (UT), 6-0, 6-7 (7-9), 6-3
\n\t#16 Eli Stephenson (UK) def. Dragos Cazacu<\/a> (UT), 3-6, 6-1, 7-6 (7-3)
\n\tJose Garcia<\/a> (UT) def. #38 Jack Loutit (UK), 4-6, 6-4, 7-5
\n\t#91 Charlelie Cosnet (UK) def. Jan Kobierski<\/a> (UT), 6-4, 7-5
\n\tMikael Arseneault (UK) def. Boruch Skierkier<\/a> (UT), 1-6, 6-2, 12-10
\n\tShion Itsusaki<\/a> (UT) def. Matt Rankin (UK), 6-2, 2-6, 10-8 <\/p>\n

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\nOrder of Finish: 4,2,3,1,5,6
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\nDoubles<\/p>\n


\n\tDragos Cazacu<\/a>\/Piotr Siekanowicz<\/a> (UT) vs. #23 Jack Loutit\/Eli Stephenson (UK), 4-5 unf.
\n\tNicolas Arseneault\/Jaden Weekes (UK) def. Shion Itsusaki<\/a>\/Ethan Muza<\/a> (UT), 6-4
\n\tMartin Breysach\/Charlelie Cosnet (UK) def. Jose Garcia<\/a>\/Alejandro Moreno<\/a> (UT), 6-1 <\/p>\n

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\nOrder of Finish: 3,2
\n\u00a0<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"LEXINGTON, Ky. — Tennessee men’s tennis team came up short at Kentucky on Saturday afternoon, falling 5-2 in…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":491116,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[442],"tags":[49,48,82,593],"class_list":["post-491115","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-tennis","tag-ca","tag-canada","tag-sports","tag-tennis"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/491115","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=491115"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/491115\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/491116"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=491115"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=491115"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=491115"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}