In its first match of the weekend, No. 15 Florida fell 4-2 to Arkansas in Fayetteville.
Florida could not find any momentum on the doubles court, losing two straight matches before it could find a win.
No. 71 Hall Fess and Pete Thomason of Arkansas defeated Mike Alford and Diego Hidalgo 8-3 on Court 2.
Minutes later, Arkansas’ No. 37 duo of Mike Nott and Manfred Jeske defeated Gordon Watson and Florent Diep 8-3 to give Arkansas the doubles point and a 1-0 lead.
"Arkansas played very good, aggressive tennis today" coach Bryan Shelton said. "We got behind from the start in both singles and doubles with a lot of uncharacteristic mistakes."
On the singles court, Elliot Orkin played one of his strongest matches of the season against Thomason. The freshman won in straight sets 6-1, 6-3 to tie the match at 1.
The only other singles win for Florida came from Hidalgo in his match against Jovan Parlic (AR), winning in a 6-1, 6-4 decision.
No. 108 Diep lost in a three set tiebreak to Manfred Jeske 6-2, 2-6, 6-4.
Sophomore Gordon Watson fell to Mike Nott (AR) 6-2, 7-6. And Mike Alford was defeated by Johan den Toom down on Court 5, 6-2, 6-4.
Next up for Florida (9-7, 4-3 Southeastern Conference) is a trip to Baton Rouge on Sunday where it will take on LSU at 1 p.m.
"It is a very bitter pill to swallow," Shelton said. "We now have to prepare for our match Sunday against LSU.”
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Sophomore Gordon Watson hits the ball during Florida's 5-2 win against North Florida on Jan. 22.
