Kansas City, Mo. ? The irony of the DNF that’s Did Not Finish next to Quentin Blakeney’s name was that, in truth, he was finishing quite nicely.
Blakeney bounced back from a lopsided 8-3 doubles tennis loss at the start of the day to take a 7-6, 2-1 lead over Baylor’s Pawel Gajdzik at No. 3 singles in the semifinal round of the Big 12 tournament on Saturday at the Plaza Tennis Center.
By then, however, the mighty Bears, ranked fourth nationally and the tournament’s top seed with an unblemished league record, already had claimed straight-set singles victories at Nos. 2, 5 and 6 to clinch the match, 4-0.
Thus, Blakeney, a sophomore from Charlotte, N.C., was saddled with a DNF.
“That was a little bit frustrating,” he said. “I was just trying to stay with my guy as long as I could to give my team a chance. I wanted to win the match. In doubles, I played really sloppy. I knew I had to play singles better to put pressure on them.”
The fourth-seeded Jayhawks didn’t apply much pressure anywhere Saturday. They lost two of three doubles matches, then lost three straight-setters in singles.
“We played like freshmen at the beginning of the singles match,” KU coach Mark Riley said. “We were playing against a good team, but we should be able to play and the nerves don’t come into it. But that team is made up of veteran seniors, and they played like seniors, and we played like freshmen.”
Some of them are. KU’s roster lists just one senior and one junior. The Jayhawks’ singles lineup Rodrigo Echagaray, Eleazar Magallan, Blakeney, Pete Stroer, Bryan Maier and Alex Barragan consisted of a senior, three sophomores and two freshmen.
“We didn’t quit,” Riley said. “We got a good foundation started. We finished in the top half of a good conference. We’re going to get better as we go along.”
That’s small consolation to Blakeney, whose freshman year also ended with a 4-0 Big 12 tournament semifinal loss to Baylor.
“Personally, I don’t like their team,” he said. “I think they’re a bunch of jerks. Last year it was 4-0. This year it’s 4-0. It’s pretty disappointing, but we can’t do anything about it. I agree with coach that we didn’t play well early. We got off to a slow start. They’re a top-five team, obviously, but I don’t think we were scared of them or afraid of them. We just didn’t play as aggressively as we needed to play. Especially in doubles, we didn’t hit too many winners. That’s what hurt us.”
Blakeney teamed with freshman Pete Stroer for an 8-3 loss to Zoltan Papp and Johannes Michalsky. Echagaray and Ed Dus fell to David Hodge and Mark Williams, 8-4.
In singles, Magallan fell to Hodge, 6-3, 6-3; Maier fell to Michalsky, 6-2, 6-3; and Barragan tumbled to Williams, 6-3, 6-1.
“At the end, we were down to four matches where we were getting to a situation where we could have split,” Riley said. “Quentin did a good job. Rodrigo did a good job. The surprise was Magallan. He didn’t play as well as usual. But we’re young, and the only way to learn is to do it by fire.”
Now the Jayhawks, 10-12 overall, must wait to see if they’ll land an at-large bid to the NCAA tournament. Baylor (21-4) will play for the tournament title today.
“We had plenty of chances all year to solidify our chances,” Riley said. “We’re probably in the tournament. But all we can do now is sit and see what the committee decides to do.”
“It’s frustrating,” Blakeney added. “We knew coming into the tournament that we were on the bubble. I think the Oklahoma State victory really gave us a better chance. But we’ll see.”
David Hodge, BU, def. Eleazar Magallan, 6-3, 6-3
Johannes Michalsky, BU, def. Bryan Maier, 6-2, 6-3
Mark Williams, BU, def. Alex Barragan, 6-3, 6-1
Hodge-Williams, BU, def. Ed Dus-Rodrigo Echagaray, 8-4
Zoltan Papp-Michalsky, BU, def. Pet Stroer-Quentin Blakeney, 8-3
