With the MAC Tournament approaching and momentum on the line, the NIU men’s tennis team faulted Saturday.

The Huskies were shut out by Western Michigan University 7-0 in their conference finale in Kalamazoo, Mich.

“We didn’t play well enough to win,” NIU coach Pontus Hiort said. “We made a lot of careless mistakes.”

NIU (10-7 overall, 2-3 MAC) stayed close with the Broncos in doubles to start, but couldn’t win the point.

The singles matches were a different story. Only NIU’s Alex Friesen was able to force a tiebreaker in singles. Friesen fell short against Alex Birchmeier 6-2, 3-6, 1-0 (10-2).

NIU junior Brian Livingston lost for the first time in 14 matches, falling to WMU’s Kevin Hayward 6-1, 6-2.

“We missed shots we normally make,” Hiort said. “Western Michigan was able to take advantage of that.”

WMU (18-7, 5-0) clinched its second-straight MAC regular season championship with the victory.
The Huskies return to action Thursday, when they host the MAC Tournament.

All comments are moderated before being published. We will not edit your comments, but we also will not approve those that are abusive, off-topic, attack another poster or contain information we know to be libelous or false.

During peak weekday viewing times, most comments will be reviewed within six hours. For more detailed information, click here.

After submitting your comment, check below for a confirmation message.

• Your name:
• Enter text from image:
  

• Your comment:

* 300-character count. HTML formatting will not display.