Jared Hiltzik never really had his legs underneath him Thursday.

The No. 1 recruit ended his first year with the Illini with a 6-0, 6-1 second-round loss to No. 8-seeded Henrique Cunha of Duke in cold, windy conditions at the Khan Outdoor Tennis Complex. Hiltzik was unseeded in the men’s singles bracket at the NCAA Championships.

The freshman, especially in the first set, struggled to get his first serve in and challenge Cunha on his service games. Even when Hiltzik had two break chances at 15-40 in the second game of the second set and another later in the set, he wasn’t able to gain control of long rallies with Cunha.

“It was a big opportunity for me, and I kind of blew it,” Hiltzik said. “I couldn’t hurt (Cunha) in any way. I just felt like I couldn’t do anything to hurt him unless I hit an amazing shot. And he just countered every single shot that I had.”

Cunha had help, too. On the first service game of the match, Hiltzik was broken after he only got in one first serve and double faulted with the game on the line. After Cunha held fairly easily, Hiltzik had a better service game but double faulted to give his opponent a two-break advantage.

At 4-0, Hiltzik saved three break points, but set up another with another double fault. This time, Cunha capitalized with a forehand winner.

“A few times (Hiltzik) did execute tactics, he missed some shot,” head coach Brad Dancer said. “He didn’t have many winning plays to build a winning game plan out there.”

While Hiltzik played progressively better throughout the match, he wasn’t able to hold serve to begin the second set. At 1-0 Cunha, Hiltzik squandered two break chances that would put the set back on serve. He missed another opportunity at 4-1 after Cunha had just broken.

When asked if that possible break at 4-1 would’ve been the difference, Hiltzik said: “I don’t think so. No. He pretty much was rolling the entire time. And my legs were shot.” Cunha advanced to the Round of 16 after hitting a forehand winner that Hiltzik wasn’t able to get a racquet on.

The Illini freshman, who will now travel to Florida for a juniors competition, was competing in 55-degree conditions after his match was delayed for more than two-and-a-half hour Thursday. This came after rain delayed play Wednesday, pushing his match back more than an hour. He finished of his opponent, Adrien Puget of UCLA, just before 10:15 p.m. and said he only got about six hours of sleep due to leg cramping, which was “definitely a factor” in the loss of sleep.

Darshan can be reached at [email protected] and @drshnpatel.