A victory at the top of the doubles lineup was all the Foresters could muster in an 8-1 loss to North Central on Saturday evening at the Racquet Club of Lake Bluff.
Senior Matt Kacyn and sophomore Brant Christensen secured the home team's only win of the night at #1 doubles against the Cardinals. Kacyn started off the match with his serve and secured the 1-0 lead. They were down 2-1 before a dropshot by Kacyn evened the score at two games apiece. Both Foresters continued serving well and built a 5-3 lead. Soon after North Central took advantage of a double fault and got back to a 5-5 tie, Kacyn and Christensen did not lose a game the rest of the way and completed the 8-5 victory with Kacyn's power serve.
The closest singles match of the night came at #1, where Kacyn started off with the same momentum he had in doubles. After using an unreachable dropshot and an ace in his first two service games, Kacyn was ahead 2-1 but eventually lost the first set 6-3. Kacyn had to see the trainer early in the second but, despite the pain, kept on playing. Trailing 6-5, he won a game that featured 13 deuces and added a 7-4 victory in the tiebreaker to tie the match at one set apiece. Kacyn fell behind in the third set super tie-breaker and, after defending one match point, fell 10-3.
Lake Forest is now 0-2 and North Central 3-1 on the young season.
The Foresters will play again next Saturday against Milwaukee School of Engineering at 12:30 p.m. and Carroll University at 6:30 p.m.