Arizona men’s tennis cracks first-ever Elite Eight with win over Oklahoma

It was expected to be a tight match between No. 8 Arizona men's tennis and No. 9 Oklahoma on Saturday afternoon at the LaNelle Robson Tennis Center, and it was just that.

The Wildcats came back from a 3-1 deficit to defeat the Sooners 4-3 on the racket of senior and the program's all-time singles wins leader, Jay Friend.

"The guys kept telling me it's never going to come down to you because I play too fast, but it did," Friend said.

The last time Friend was in this position was against UCF last season with the match on his racket.

"I've been in this position before and the last time I lost 7-6 in the third set, so obviously I was fighting those demons a little bit," he said. "The guys did their job and that took so much pressure off me."

It was a rough start for Arizona (24-4), dropping the doubles point and the first completed singles match to fall behind 2-0.

It was sophomore Glib Sekachov, who missed both of last week's matches due to an illness, who got the Wildcats on the board with a 6-3, 6-2 win on Court 6.

After Oklahoma took Court 2 to take a 3-1 lead, Arizona found itself one more loss away from having its season end in the Sweet 16 again.

Junior Sasha Rozin battled through two tiebreak wins to cut the deficit to 3-2 before freshman Alejandro Arcilo took home his match 6-4, 4-6, 6-4 on Court 5.

It all came down to Friend, who double-faulted to lose the second set before he found another gear in the final set to cruise to a 6-0 win and send the Wildcats on to the final stage.

"I entered a flow state that I've never been in before," Friend said.

Arizona continues to find different ways to make history under head coach Clancy Shields. This time, it's advancing past the Sweet 16 and onto the final stage.

"This is like a celebration of tennis in Tucson," Shields said. "I mean, you're looking at everybody sticking around, and everybody who is here has played a small part in our journey to get here.

"They're sticking around because we haven't been able to get this far. We've been to the Sweet Sixteen, but we haven't gotten any further and I think you saw that today. We got down 3-1 and I think the guys said this is our year. This is destiny."

Arizona will take on top-seeded and defending national champion Wake Forest (33-3) in the Elite Eight on Thursday in Athens, Ga. The other quarterfinal matchups will be No. 4 Virginia vs. No. 5 Mississippi State, No. 3 TCU vs. No. 6 Stanford and No. 2 Texas vs. No. 10 Baylor.