The No. 36 Oregon men’s tennis team kicked off its final regular season weekend in the Bay Area with a 4-1 loss to No. 4 Stanford.
The Ducks went into Friday having won six of their past seven matches, but were no match against the top-5 Cardinal.
Although the match did not go the team’s way, they still had a decent performance against a highly-ranked Stanford squad. The Cardinal possess two of the top-50 doubles pairs and three of the top-100 singles players.
Sophomore Ty Gentry won the only point for the Ducks, downing No. 90 Sameer Kumar 6-3, 6-3 in straight sets. The win was Gentry’s first in the No. 3 position. With three seniors graduating, Gentry will most likely become a regular in the top-3 of the lineup next season.
Gentry’s move up was necessary because the usual No. 2 position, Simon Stevens, was absent from the lineup. Ethan Young-Smith made his fourth start of the season in place of Stevens, fighting hard in the six position and earning an unfinished match against William Genesen.
Other changes in the lineup included Akihiro Tanaka moving from third to second and Riki Oshima moving from six to five.
In the No. 1 spot, per usual, was No. 24 Thomas Laurent. He was matched-up against No. 8 Tom Fawcett. The highly-anticipated top-25 matchup wound up going unfinished however with Fawcett leading.

👀👀👀 That serve! #GoDucks pic.twitter.com/FPReq62Nkc

— Oregon Men's Tennis (@OregonMTennis) April 20, 2018

Stanford’s three singles points came from two, four and five positions. No. 70 Axel Geller downed Tanaka 6-3, 6-2 and David Wilczynski defeated Oshima 6-0, 6-2. After Gentry put the Ducks on the board, Eric Fomba ended all hopes of a comeback, clinching the match over Cormac Clissold 7-6, 6-2.
The doubles point also went Stanford’s way. The No. 24 pair of Geller and Fawcett gave the Cardinal the advantage with a 6-3 win over Stevens and Gentry. The No. 50 pair of Kumar and Michael Genender clinched the point with a 7-5 win over No. 33 Clissold and Laurent.
Earning a team win in Palo Alto might have been too steep of a task for the Ducks, but a win against Cal on Saturday at 1 p.m. would put them at 16-8 on the season and most likely secure them a spot in the NCAA Tournament.
Follow Maverick Pallack on Twitter @mavpallack