Men’s tennis wrapped up play Friday, Oct. 19th at the ITA Mountain Regionals Tournament. Nevada climbed into the championship match for both the singles bracket, as well as the doubles bracket, but fell short at each stage.

Junior Julien Evrard competed in the singles bracket, making it to the championships but fell 7-6, 6-3 in his sets against New Mexico’s Rickey Hernandez-Tong. Evrard opened day two with a win over Southern Utah’s Jonathan Morales, dropping the first set 6-2, but recovering to finish winning the next two sets 7-5, 6-1. He advanced into the round of 32 where he had similar outcome against Utah’s Randy Cory, scoring 7-5, 6-2.

Evrard took two wins on day three, one against Utah State’s Isaac Arevalo — 6-0,6-3 — and the other against New Mexico’s Stepan Holis — 4-4, 6-3. The match against Holis would advance Evrard into a semifinals match against BYU’s Sean Hill.

The semifinal match against Hill in day four of the competition proved to be close but saw the same outcome as his previous matches, Evrard took the victory with a score 6-4,6-4. Unfortunately for Evrard and Nevada, this would be his final singles win of the tournament, though he found success in the doubles bracket as well.

Nevada’s leading doubles team was manned by Junior Kostya Nesterenko and Evrard. The pair easily defeated New Mexico’s Nicolas Prieto and Dominic West – 8-2 – in the round of 32. They followed up the previous round’s performance by again dispatching their opponents quickly, this time New Mexico State’s Louis Menard and Enrique Asmar, the match finished with a score of 8-3.

For the qualifying round of the doubles tournament, the Nevada duo faced off against Svyatoslav Shainyan and David Micevski of Utah. The pair played a hard-fought match that ultimately saw Nevada pull ahead of their Utah opponents with a final score of 8-5. Their semi-finals match would again be Utah athletes, this time featuring Cory and Russell Benkalm. The match resulted in two close sets but saw the Wolf Pack pulling ahead in each, 6-4, 6-4.

Unfortunately for Nesterenko and Evrard, their time at the ITA Mountain Regionals doubles tournament ended in heartbreak. The pair dropped their matches against Ruben Montano and Tim Handle of Northern Arizona, 7-5, 6-4.

Thanks to Evrard’s performance at the ITA Mountain Regionals, he will be competing in the Oracle ITA National Championships. The 128-person tournament will be held in Surprise, Arizona on Nov. 7-11.

The Wolf Pack now look to bounce back against Fresno State Friday, Nov. 2 – Sunday, Nov 4.

Ryan Freeberg can be reached at dstrugs@sagebrush.unr.edu and on Twitter @SagebrushSports.