UNCG 6, Navy 1
GREENSBORO, N.C. - UNCG snapped a two-match losing streak with a 6-1 win over Navy on Saturday at the Starmount Forest Country Club Indoor Courts. The Spartans won all six singles matches.
The Spartans (4-2) dropped a hotly contested doubles point to fall behind 1-0 early but would come roaring back in singles play.
Senior Yaroslav Litus knotted the match at 1 with a win at No. 3, breezing past Zach Nicholson 6-1, 6-2. Timion Meijs picked up a 6-0, 6-3 win over Marcus Rebersak at No. 2 to put UNCG ahead to stay, and Chanon Varapongsittikul made it a 3-1 match with a 6-1, 6-3 win over Jeremy New at No. 4.
Orcun Seyrek clinched the match at No. 1, picking up a 6-4, 4-6, 6-0 win over Owen Bullard. Freshman Ahmet Sarioglu remained undefeated in the dual portion of the season with a 6-3, 6-4 win over Nicholas Gutsche at No. 5. Sarioglu moved to 6-0 on the season.
Redshirt freshman Zach Reece grabbed a 6-2, 7-6 (7-5) win over Matt Richmond at No. 6 to complete the singles sweep.
The Midshipmen (7-2), playing on the road for just the second time on the season, picked up the doubles point after pulling out tight matches at Nos. 1 and 2.
Bullard and Nick Birger topped Seyrek and Sarioglu at No. 1, 9-8, winning the tiebreaker 8-6. No. 2 also went to a tiebreaker, with Gutsche and Nicholson slipping past Varapongsittikul and Meijs, 9-8 (8-3).
Litus and Jacob Wright grabbed UNCG's lone doubles win at No. 3, downing Rebersak and Anderson Walls, 8-5.
UNCG returns to action on Saturday, Feb. 26, when it will face UNC Wilmington in Wilmington, N.C. The match is slated to begin at 1 p.m.
Samford 7, Belmont 0
BIRMINGHAM, Ala. --- The Samford University men's tennis team extended its winning streak to four-consecutive matches Saturday as the Bulldogs tallied a 7-0 victory against the Belmont Bruins in an early-season non-conference duel held at the Samford Tennis Center.
With the win, Samford (5-1) remained undefeated at home this season and improved to 5-0 when playing in Birmingham. The Bulldogs have not relinquished a single point in home matches this season and have outscored their opponents by a lopsided 35-0 margin.
Belmont (0-1) suffered its second straight loss to Samford. Last season, the Bruins dropped a 4-3 decision against the Bulldogs in a match held at the Davis Tennis Complex in Nashville, Tenn.
Samford earned Saturday's doubles point with victories on courts No. 2 and No. 3. The Bulldogs' combination of Zac Dunkle and Alexander Sajonz defeated Belmont's pairing of Bruno Silva and Jonathan Murrell in the No. 2 doubles contest, while Samford's tandem of Carson Kadi and Fernando Costa topped the Bruins' duo of Felipe Cirne Lima and Christopher Bates on court No. 3, 8-4.
After earning the doubles point, the Bulldogs received singles wins from Kadi, Dunkle, Carl Abalos, Oliver Reynolds, Costa and Sajonz to register the 7-0 team victory.
Samford dominated the bottom half of the lineup as Reynolds tallied a 6-0, 6-1 win on court No. 4, Costa earned a 6-0, 6-0 victory in the No. 5 singles match and Sajonz defeated Bates 6-0, 6-1 on court No. 6.
Dunkle, the Bulldogs' sophomore from Atlanta, Ga., cruised to a 6-0, 6-4 triumph in the No. 2 singles contest, while Kadi outlasted Belmont's Rodrigo Amaral 6-1, 3-6, 10-7 on court No. 1. Samford's Abalos, the reigning Southern Conference Player of the Week, was also victorious in a three-set battle as he tallied a 6-4, 1-6, 10-3 win against Silva on court No. 3.
Abalos remained undefeated in singles play this season and improved his record to 5-0. The Bulldogs' Costa, Dunkle, Kadi, Reynolds and Sajonz all moved to 4-1 in singles play this year.
The Samford University men's tennis team will next be in action Friday at 2:30 p.m. (CST) as the Bulldogs continue their nine-match homestand against the North Alabama Lions at the Samford Tennis Center.
College of Charleston 5, Charlotte 2
College of Charleston 9, Winston-Salem State 0
CHARLOTTE, N.C. - The College of Charleston men's tennis team improved to 3-1 on the season with a 5-2 road victory over UNC Charlotte and a 9-0 shut out of Winston-Salem State on Saturday.
The Cougars won four of six singles matches and the doubles point to get past the 49ers (3-5), while defeating the Rams (1-3) in straight sets in singles and sweeping the doubles.
Junior Tom Delme and sophomore Stephen Hardy, a transfer from James Madison, remain an undefeated 4-0 on the season in doubles play with a pair of 8-5 victories over Charlotte and WSSU.
CofC will return to action with a noon dual match at Georgia State on Saturday, Feb. 26, in Atlanta, Ga.
Davidson 6, Lees Mc-Rae 1
UNC Asheville 5, Davidson 2
DAVIDSON, N.C. - The Davidson men's tennis team returned home after a trip to the Northeast last weekend and earned a split in its two matches, taking a 6-1 decision vs. Lees-McRae in the morning before falling to UNC Asheville, 5-2, in its last match of the day at the Covington Tennis Courts on Saturday.
Davidson ran its record to 3-6 on the season, while Lees-McRae fell to 1-3 and UNC Asheville improved to 2-3. The Bobcats entered the day ranked 23rd in Division II.
The day started out with the Wildcats capturing the doubles point after taking the No. 1 and 2 doubles spots. Joe Schafer and Chris Mark took an 8-4 win at No. 1 for their first win together. Then Ethan Kallick and Walker Lyons seal up the point with an 8-1 win at No. 2.
The 'Cats then took five of the six singles matches in straight sets to score the 6-1 win. Mark took home a 6-1, 6-2 win, his second at No. 2 singles, while both Kallick and Lyons scored victories of 6-1, 6-4 and 6-2, 6-1 at No. 3 and 6 singles, respectively. Lyons earned his fifth singles win of the year, while Kallick scored his first collegiate singles win.
Both Arie Hefter and Kevin Moore closed out the team win with strong victories at No. 4 and 5 positions. Hefter defeated Pedro de Sousa Nunes 6-4, 6-0, while Moore picked up a 6-3, 6-1 win over Graham Battle to improve to 3-4 on the season.
In the afternoon, the Wildcats jumped out to a 1-0 lead in team points thanks again to the strong doubles play of Schafer and Mark along with Kallick and Lyons. The two pair of doubles teams won 8-4 and 8-5 at the top-two spots. The two doubles wins on the day by Kallick and Lyons were their first together as a team.
The Bulldogs came back and took five of the six singles matches to earn the win, but the 'Cats did not go down without a fight. They forced the Bulldogs in four three-set matches.
Mark was the lone Wildcat to score a singles win, taking a 4-6, 6-2, 6-2 win at No. 3 singles over Matt Waissen.
Schafer played three tightly contested matches at No. 1, dropping a 6-7, 6-3, 6-4 decision. Moore also played three close matches at No. 5, falling just short in a 3-6, 7-5, 6-4 match against Jonas Brobeck. The Wildcats last three-setter was at No. 6 with Ethan Kallick dropping a 4-6, 6-4, 6-3.
Davidson will play at Winthrop on Wednesday, Feb. 23, with the match set for 3 p.m.
VCU 5, Elon 2
RICHMOND, Va. -- The 68th-ranked Elon men's tennis team suffered a 5-2 setback at Virginia Commonwealth on Saturday afternoon. The loss dropped the Phoenix to 3-3 overall while VCU upped its mark to 8-3.
Elon's 56th-rated doubles pair of Philip Nemec and Chase Helpingstine picked up a win at number one doubles by an 8-7 score, but the Phoenix fell at both two and three by identical 8-4 margins. At number two, Alberto Rojas and Cameron Silverman were on the wrong end of the score while the duo of Cody Stauffer-MacDowell and Thomas Darling were Elon's number three team.
The Phoenix picked up its two points with wins at number five and six singles. At number five, Rojas was a 6-3, 4-6, 6-4 winner while Stauffer-MacDowell won after his opponent retired in the second set.
Nemec came up short in a tightly contested bout, falling 7-5, 7-6 (7-4) at number one. In a three-set match at number two, Elon's Eric Turner dropped a 6-3, 3-6, 6-1 decision. A hard-fought contest at number three saw the Phoenix's Silverman fall short by a 4-6, 7-6 (7-5), 7-6 (7-2) margin. Finally, Helpingstine fell 6-0, 6-3 at number four.
Elon is scheduled to play at William & Mary tomorrow morning at 10 a.m.
North Florida 7, Georgia Southern 0
JACKSONVILLE, Fla. - Georgia Southern Men's Tennis continued its stretch of matches on the road as it fell to North Florida, 0-7, at the UNF Tennis Complex Saturday afternoon. North Florida's Moritz Buerchner and Georgia Southern's Juan Manuel Melian Puigventos battled to a super tiebreak, but Buerchner defeated Puigventos at number-one singles 3-6, 6-3, 10-8 in the last match of the day for the sophomore's first loss of the year.
The Eagles No. 1 doubles team of Puigventos and Matthijs Verdam defeated the Ospreys' Buerchner and Pedro Davisson, 8-4, but earlier wins by UNF secured the doubles point as the Ospreys took 8-2 wins at both the No. 2 and No. 3 doubles matches.
At number-four singles, GSU's Marco Osorio took a 6-3 win in the first set over North Florida's Leonardo Nahar, but Nahar fought back with a 6-2 second-set win. The super tiebreak went to an 11-9 score with Nahar taking the victory. North Florida took the wins at all remaining spots as Daniel Sotomarino posted a win over
Alain Garrido, 6-1, 6-0. Edio Castanhel fell to Beauregard Treyz at No. 5 singles and Thomas Bekkers lost to Derrick Davisson at the number-six spot in the lineup.
The Eagles face Mercer Saturday, February 26th at 12 p.m. before returning home to the Hanner Tennis Complex for Florida A&M, Sunday, February 27th. The match against the Rattlers starts at 12 p.m.