Texas swept by TCU in its first-ever ITA Indoor National Championship final
February 20, 2023
After a great run to its first-ever ITA Indoor National Championship final, No.7 Texas was swept 0-4 by No. 3 TCU.
The Longhorns looked poised to continue their underdog run, coming off three straight top-10 wins against No. 9 Wake Forest, No. 1 Ohio State and No. 4 Michigan. However, Texas seemed to run out of gas on Monday afternoon as the Longhorns were unable to continue their winning stretch.
The undefeated Horned Frogs started strong in doubles, with two European pairings coming away with victories to secure the doubles point. Freshman Jack Pinnington and senior Sander Jong set the tone with a 6-4 win over Texas sophomore Pierre-Yves Bailly and junior Siem Woldeab. Junior Jake Fearnley and senior Luc Fomba pulled off one of the biggest upsets of the weekend, with a 7-5 win over Texas’ No. 4 pairing of redshirt junior Cleeve Harper and junior Eliot Spizzirri.
Pinnington and Jong continued their prolific day despite being unranked in both singles and as a doubles pairing, winning the first two singles points for TCU and putting them into a 3-0 lead over Texas. Pinnington beat No. 65 Texas junior Micah Braswell in a competitive first set but then blanked Braswell in the second for a 6-4, 6-0 win. Shortly after, Jong outplayed No. 25 Woldeab with a 6-2, 6-3 win in which he broke Woldeab’s serve four times, never had his own serve broken and served five aces.
Ironically, sealing the victory for the Horned Frogs against his hometown school was No.124 freshman Sebastian Gorzny with a 6-4, 6-1 win over Harper. The freshman got through a back-and-forth first set before he dominated the second, winning 11 of the final 12 games, including three crucial break points.
TCU, two-time defending Big 12 regular season champions, have now won back-to-back ITA Indoor National Championships under former TCU star David Roditi. The undefeated Horned Frogs will play Texas in Fort Worth on March 4 and will come to Austin on April 15, the last game in both teams’ regular season.
Texas will look to bounce back on Sunday against in-state rival No. 25 Texas A&M in Austin before its trip to Fort Worth.
