Sacramento State men’s tennis team was not able to beat their causeway rival, No. 72 ranked UC Davis, with Saturday’s final match score ending heavily in the Aggies’ favor, 6-1.

The Hornets’ best opportunities to score came in their doubles matches Saturday as each pairing had an opportunity to win their set. The No. 1 pairing, Sean Kolar and Marek Marksoo, and No. 3 pairing, Niranjan Ram and Kasparas Zemaitelis, saw their games get to break point where they eventually lost 7-6.

“It was competitive and our energy was great,” coach Kevin Kurtz said. “It was the best doubles we’ve played this season.”

A big positive for the Hornets came from the continued growth of Zemaitelis, who was the only Sac State player to take his singles match into a third set on the day. His final set did not finish as Davis had already won the overall match.

“He played a really good first set, but didn’t play his way during the second set.” Kurtz said.

Kurtz also thought that Kolar played and finished well in both singles and doubles this week. He finished strong and gave the Hornets their only match point, beating Alec Adamson 6-4, 6-4 in straight sets. He is now 2-1 in singles play this season.

Ram and Roy Brandys, the Hornets No. 2 and No. 3 singles players, were not able to get much going this week and lost their matches 2-6, 2-6 and 1-6, 0-6, respectively.

Marksoo and Tom Miller, the Hornets No. 4 and No. 6 singles players, did not take a set in their matches this week either and lost 2-6, 5-7 and 1-6, 1-6, respectively.

While the team was hoping for a much better result in a rivalry game, they’re already looking towards their Tuesday matchup against Stanford University.

“We didn’t have as much of a team vibe as we did last week,” Kurtz said. “The guys will practice a bit tomorrow and on Monday and we’ll see what we can do.”

The Hornets will continue their season at Stanford on Tuesday, Feb. 17.