Men's Tennis Southern Conference

Elon Downs Gardner-Webb, 4-3

BOILING SPRINGS, N.C. -- Days after moving into the national rankings, the No. 65 Elon Phoenix men's tennis squad picked up a 4-3 road victory over the Gardner-Webb Runnin' Bulldogs on Thursday afternoon.  The Phoenix improved to 2-1 on the young season while Gardner-Webb dropped to 0-2.

Elon's number two doubles tandem of Alberto Rojas and Cameron Silverman jumped on top of the GWU pairing of Korhan Ates and Julien Belair and never looked back, cruising to an 8-1 victory.  The Phoenix then clinched the doubles point when Philip Nemec and Cody Stauffer-MacDowell earned an 8-4 win over Andrew Veeder and Andrew Carter at the top doubles spot.

The Phoenix made it a clean sweep of the doubles action as Eric Turner and Thomas Darling dropped the duo of Roman Piftor and Matthew Parker by an 8-6 score at number three.

Elon took a 2-0 lead when the number four singles match went to the Phoenix's Rojas who claimed a 6-1, 6-2 decision over Veeder.  The advantage stretched to 3-0 as Carlos Arboleda  handed Carter a 6-1, 6-4 defeat at number six.

Gardner-Webb began its comeback at number two singles where Ates defeated Elon's Silverman 6-4, 6-2 to make it a 3-1 match.  Elon's lead was trimmed to just a point at 3-2 after Stauffer-MacDowell fell to GWU's Piftor 4-6, 5-7 at number five.

The contests at both number one and three went three sets before the Phoenix clinched the match with a 4-6, 6-1, 6-4 victory at number three by Turner who defeated Adam Knutsson.  Turner's victory came just minutes before Gardner-Webb claimed its final point of the match as Belair knocked off Nemec 3-6, 6-3, 6-4.

Elon will be off until Feb. 5 when the Phoenix welcomes UNC Wilmington to the Jimmy Powell Tennis Center for a 1 p.m. match.