While watching the opening few minutes of doubles play in the No. 66 Penn State men's tennis team's 6-1 loss to No. 3 Illinois, there was a certain feeling in the air.

Then, as the singles matches got underway, the feeling grew stronger. Watching the Nittany Lions' No. 1 singles player, Mark Barry, face off against the top player in the country, Ryler DeHeart, I knew I had felt this before.

It was the same feeling in the air during the football team's 2003 game against Ohio State, and likewise, this past season's game with Purdue. You just knew something was going to happen -- there was electricity.

"[It was a] big-time match," Penn State coach Jan Bortner said. "The quality level of tennis, on a scale of one to 10 -- that was a 10. You had two outstanding players playing at a very high level."

Just as in those football games, Penn State's effort was outstanding, something you were glad to see in person, but, in the end, it came up just short. It wasn't just the unbelievably close score by which Barry lost -- 5-7, 6-4, 6-7 -- but that during the match, people sort of knew that he was going to pull off the upset.

To start off the first set, Barry did the unthinkable; he broke DeHeart's monstrous serve. To me, it looked like Barry took the hard-serving DeHeart off his game, like a power pitcher denied his fastball. Turns out I jumped the gun on that whole assumption, as DeHeart proved to be more than just a power player. Regardless, for Barry to be able to stand up to that firepower proved that this was going to be a long day for the Illini's top player.

And then Barry held his serve -- up a break on the No. 1 player in the country after two games, it was really going to happen, wasn't it? DeHeart was able to break Barry, tying the first set 2-2, and it looked like maybe it was time for the best of the best to take over, but Barry came right back and broke DeHeart's serve, again. It was really going down like this; we were all going to see Barry knock off the No. 1 player. At one point, Barry was leading 5-4 and serving for the first set. Barry said after the match that, overall, the team's match could have come down to a few shots here and there.

A few shots here and Barry takes the first set, putting DeHeart in a big hole, and, well, the rest could have been history. But, showing why he was the top player, DeHeart rattled off three games and stole the first set from Barry, 7-5.

As the second set got underway, Barry could have curled up and died, being a whole set down to a player of that magnitude, but Barry continued to fight. Cue the "Going the Distance" music and montage of the rounds marching on from the Rocky movies. The two traded one great shot after another. The second and third sets featured long volleys and stunning shots -- the kind of rips down the line or backhands knocked cross-court, landing impossibly close to the corners, that you just don't see in a collegiate tennis match.

By the third set, there was applause after nearly every point, and I'm not sure if this was because it was on the first court or not, but I got the feeling that everyone in attendance knew they were seeing something special. I even overheard more than a few people this weekend refer to the match as the best collegiate tennis they ever saw.

"The speed, the execution, the intensity, the tactics, everything was at such a high level," Bortner said. "It was just a big-time college tennis match."

Late in the third, Barry was down 5-6 and serving to keep this match of a lifetime going just a little bit longer. In big-time match fashion, he smoked DeHeart with some huge serves and forced a deciding tie-break. Now, I'm not sure if losing a third-set tiebreaker is quite the same as barely missing a 60-yard game-winning field goal attempt, or having a Hail Mary fall a few yards short, but this match was really as close as it could get. In the end, Barry just could not hold off DeHeart's big serves and once he lost a few points on his own, DeHeart was able to pull away. He won the tie-break 7-3, surviving one of the closest calls he might ever face during his time at Illinois. After the match, Barry had a quiet confidence about him, knowing how close he came to knocking off DeHeart. The experience of that match should follow Barry as he takes on the top players for each Big Ten team each weekend. The match will likely push Barry for an individual ranking at singles, and if that isn't enough to garner national attention, I'm sure knocking off a few more high-ranked players this season will.

So, while Barry's match could be seen as a heartbreaking close-call, I'd bet on it being more of a building block for him and the rest of the team, which certainly has the tools to make some noise in the Big Ten and push for a bid to the NCAA Championships.