Samaha's Thiller Clinches First Win of the Season

ARLINGTON, Texas — Georgio Samaha took a thriller in three sets, winning 6-7 (6-8), 6-4, 6-2 to clinch a come-from-behind 4-3 win at UT Arlington, giving UNM its first win of the season and head coach Rob Bareford his first win as Lobo head coach.  UNM won four singles matches for the victory after dropping the doubles point.  The Lobos face Baylor on Sunday to finish off the three-match opening weekend in Texas.

UNM fell in doubles 2-1 to go down 1-0 in the match.  The Lobos did get a win from Aram Noroozian and Samaha in doubles at No. 1, but UNM fell in the other three matches.  From there, UNM needed four singles wins, and that’s what they got.

Despite the 1-0 UTA lead, the match was headed to a 2-2 tie as Aram Noroozian and Avery Tallakson worked out straight set wins while Daniil Kakhniuk lost at No. 2.  For Noroozian, that was his first victory at No. 1 singles.  That evened the match at 2-2 with three singles matches going to a third set.  That’s where UNM took over, with leads by Samaha and Aditya Balsekar at Nos. 3 and 4 and Dario Ciobotaru in a dogfight at No. 5.  That put UNM in the drivers seat.  Balsekar was on the way to a win when hies opponent Mattea Ricci retired, giving him a 5-7, 6-3, 5-0 win.  Ciobotaru had a shot for a clinch but lost in a tiebreaker 3-6, 6-1, 7-6 (7-3), leading the match tied but with Samaha in the lead.

He didn’t falter, which is par for the course.  His 74th career singles win came in a strong 6-2 final set to give UNM its first win of the season.