WILMINGTON, NC – The North Carolina A&T men's tennis massive winning streak ended on Tuesday with a 4-0 loss to the defending Colonial Athletic Association (CAA) champion UNC Wilmington at the UNCW Tennis Courts. 

The Aggies winning streak at 13 straight as they dropped to 13-1 overall and 1-1 in the CAA. UNCW has won eight CAA tournament championships in 13 years and moved to 12-6 overall and 2-0 in league play. 

"I am incredibly proud of the fight some of my guys showed today," said A&T head coach Dejon Bivens. "This is what I expect from our team. The good news is we can be 1,000 times better, which is what we will work for. This is our first loss of the season, so it is an unusual feeling for us, but it is a necessary step in our evolution." 

The match opened with A&T's Esteban Lopez and Vasil Ivanov losing to Drew Broadstreet and Trey Mallory 6-1. Eder Blanco and Alex Martinez tried to keep the Aggies alive for the doubles point but lost to Reece Falck and Alex de Gabriele 6-4. No. 3 doubles went unfinished, with the A&T duo of Mathieu Dussaubat and Ian Pedersen leading Gabe Hurtado and Davide Innocenti 5-4. 

"The doubles match was really intense, and we had our chances," said Blanco. "We lost, but if we were a little bit more into it, we would have taken it." 

UNCW took a 2-0 lead when Dussaubat lost to Samuel de Felipe Garcia 6-2, 6-1. Then, at No. 1 singles, Flack ended Lopez's seven-match singles winning streak with a 6-3, 6-2 win. Lopez's last loss came on March 19 in a three-set defeat to Norfolk State's Federico Rebecchini. He is 10-4 on the season. 

Innocenti clinched the win for the Seahawks with a 6-2, 6-1 win over Pedersen at No. 4 singles. Pedersen lost for only the second time this season in singles as he dropped to 12-2. 

"We will not take this loss as the end of the world," said Bivens. "We will use it to motivate us even more. We lost to the reigning CAA championship team, but we will bring the fire the next time we play this team or any other team. I will not let us forget this loss. We love winning, and we will win again. That I promise." 

In the unfinished matches, the Aggies did look competitive against the perennial CAA power. Ivano led Mallory 7-5, 1-0 at No. 3 singles. At No. 5 singles, Martinez won the first set over de Gabriele 7-6, 7-5 in the tiebreaker and trailed 1-0 in the second. Meanwhile, Blanco lost the No. 2 singles first set 6-3 to Hurtado, but he led 4-2 when the match ended. 

"I was really mad," said Blanco about his match's cancelation. "The guy was solid, but I knew if the match had kept going, I would have taken it. But, overall, it was a good intense match played at a really high level." 

The Aggies will try to return to their winning ways on Friday when they face fellow Greensboro school Guilford College at 2 p.m., Friday, April 14, at the Dorothy Ragsdale McMichael '37 Centennial Class Courts.