DENVER – The University of Denver men's tennis team (7-5, 0-0 Summit) began its weekend at Denver Tennis Park with a 5-2 win over No. 65-ranked Utah State on Friday evening.
 
DU once again started with a win in doubles before going on to clinch the win up 4-0 and eventually taking a 5-0 lead overall.
 
Doubles:
For the second match in a row, Denver collected the doubles point, taking the decisions in the Nos. 2 and 3 spots. Junior Raffaello Papajcik returned to play for DU for the first time since February 2, teaming up with classmate Ryoma Mishiro at No. 3 doubles and getting Denver halfway to the point with a dominant 6-2 win. They took a break lead at 2-1 and added a second break to go up 5-2, successfully serving it out in the next game.
 
DU's team of senior Daniel Sancho Arbizu and freshman Theo Coats clinched the point for DU with their eighth win in 2025 and did so in comeback fashion. After being broken in their first service game and facing a 0-3 deficit in the next game, they got back to even terms at 3-3 and followed it with another break on their way to a 5-3 lead. They held match points against Utah State's serve at 5-4 but were unable to convert, instead winning the next game on serve at love.
 
In the top matchup, graduate student Connor Robb-Wilcox and senior Rikuto Yamaguchi also held match points at both 5-3 and 5-4 but could not finish it off. They were one point away from holding to force a tiebreak when the match was abandoned.
 
Singles:
Denver moved to 2-0 on the scoreboard with a strong performance from Robb-Wilcox at No. 5 singles. After going down a break and 1-3 in the first set, he fought back to get to 4-4, claimed his first lead up 5-4 and served it out at 6-4. He sealed the win with a bagel in the second set, winning the final nine games of the match.
 
Freshman Samuel Rovai put DU within a point of the dual, winning in two sets at No. 3 singles. His first set was close at the start before he began to pull away with a break for 4-2. He consolidated with an easy hold in the next game and then broke once more to finish it off. The second set saw him win the first three games before his opponent held serve. Rovai broke in his next return game to take a 5-1 lead but saw a few double faults hand the break back in the next game. He refocused and was able to keep the remainder of the set on serve, eventually winning it at 6-3.
 
Sancho Arbizu clinched the dual for Denver with a straight-sets victory on the top court. He raced out to a 4-0 lead in the first set but gave one break back in the fifth game, though it did not prove to be of much harm as the DU senior was still able to serve out the set, 6-3. He traded breaks to start the second set, then broke in two more return games on his way to a 6-2 win.
 
Mishiro had one of his strongest singles performances of the year with only four games lost in his No. 4 singles match. Like Sancho Arbizu, he went up 4-0 in the first set before closing it out at 6-1. An early second-set break set him up for the win, despite the final frame proving tighter than the first.
 
USU earned its first point of the day in a 10-point match tiebreak at No. 6. DU freshman Coats rallied back after losing a tight first set to dominate the second set, 6-1, though his opponent took control of the breaker midway through and claimed it, 10-5.
 
The Aggies also won the final match to wrap up, using a first-set tiebreak and a 6-2 second set to win at No. 2 singles.
 
Up Next:
The University of Denver men's tennis team plays again at Denver Tennis Park on Sunday, February 23, when it hosts Jacksonville State at 10:30 a.m. MT.
 
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