Georgia Southern 4, Mercer 3
MACON, Ga. - The Georgia Southern Men's Tennis (1-0) team beat Mercer (0-2) 4-3 on Saturday afternoon at the LeRoy Peddy Tennis Center in Macon, Ga. After clinching the doubles and the first singles points, the Eagles lost three matches straight before senior Mattijs Verdam and redshirt freshman Carson Jones clinched the match.
"I'm very proud of Carson," said Head Coach Nick Zieziula. "He has shown resistance for the last year and a half and today he did it again. This is definitely something we can learn from as a team."
Jones overcame a 3-0 deficit as well as a tiebreaker in the second set to beat Mercer's Austin Emmet 4-6, 7-6 (7-5), 6-0, clinching the match for the Eagles after more than four hours of overall competition. The Macon native, who sat out the 2012 season due to compliance regulations and battled a shoulder injury in the fall, made his first collegiate start in front of a hometown crowd at the number six position.
With the Eagles behind 3-2, Verdam came back from a 4-1 deficit in the third set at the number one spot to clinch his own match 6-3, 3-6, 6-4.
Sophomore Albert Codina Sala started things off for the Eagles with a quick match at number three against Mercer's Joao Pagan, winning both sets 6-1.
Sophomore Andrew Dromsky and junior Oliver Webb came out on top in a close doubles match at the number one spot, winning the tiebreaker 7-5 en route of beating Mercer's Victor Dias and Pagan with a final score of 9-8. At number two, the duo existing of senior Alex Doherty, who appeared in his first match for the Eagles after transferring from Ball State last year, and Jones beat Mercer's Emmett and Vincent DeLise 8-2, making it possible for Dromsky and Webb to take home the doubles point.
"Mercer played one great game. They battled hard and made it extremely tough on us and I am glad for us to come out on top," said Zieziula.
The Eagles will be back on the court next weekend as they travel to Atlanta to take on Georgia State and Kennesaw St. in back to back matches on Saturday, Feb. 9 and Sunday, Feb. 10.
Samford 5, Austin Peay 2
BIRMINGHAM, Ala. - The Samford University men's tennis team opened its 2013 dual-match season with a key nonconference victory Saturday as the Bulldogs outlasted the scrappy Austin Peay Governors, 5-2, in a hard-fought battle held at the Samford Tennis Center.
"Overall, we did a great job today," said Samford head coach Rahim Esmail. "There are a lot of things that I was very pleased with. I think Austin Peay will be one of the favorites to win the OVC (Ohio Valley Conference) this year, as they won the regular season last year, and this was a great way to start the season with a quality win over a very solid team. I give Austin Peay a lot of credit. They did not go away on any of the courts and made us earn each of the five wins that we had."
In doubles play, Samford (1-0) rallied for a pair of 8-7 (5) victories on courts Nos. 2 and 3 to streak to an early 1-0 lead in the match.
After losing the first of the three doubles contests Saturday, the Bulldogs' tandem of Elliot Barnwell and Garrison Laduca, as well as Samford's combination of Fares Kilani and Austin Akers came up with huge 8-7 (5) triumphs over their Austin Peay (0-1) competitors. By hanging on to win on courts Nos. 2 and 3, the Bulldogs took a critical 1-0 early advantage in the overall team match.
Samford then quickly increased its lead to 3-0 with straight-set singles wins from freshmen Akers and Kilani. Akers cruised past the Governors' Iago Seffrin on court No. 5, 6-2, 6-0, while Kilani knocked off Austin Peay's Dimitar Ristovski, 6-3, 6-4, in the No. 3 singles contest.
"Our freshmen, Fares and Austin, did a great job today, Esmail said. "They played extremely disciplined tennis and played with great composure. I was very impressed with the way they played in their first college match and was also impressed with the confidence and positive energy that they displayed."
Austin Peay mounted a late comeback in singles with victories on courts Nos. 2 and 4 from Jasmin Ademovic and Aleksas Tverijonas. Ademovic tallied a 2-6, 6-4, 6-1 triumph in the No. 2 singles match, while Tverijonas posted a 7-5, 6-2 win court No. 4.
"We do need to focus on putting matches (teams) away when we have the opportunity," said Esmail. "On several courts, we let players back into the match at some point and we cannot afford to do this against the quality of opponents that we will be competing against this season. We were fortunate enough to squeeze out the doubles point, which gave us some positive momentum heading into singles. We are looking forward to getting a good week of practice in, and getting after it again next weekend."
Samford's final singles victories of the match came from Dunkle on court No. 1 and Laduca on court No. 6.
Dunkle, the Bulldogs' highly-decorated All-Southern Conference performer from Atlanta, Ga., battled back to defeat Austin Peay's Sean Bailey, 4-6, 6-4, 6-1, in the No. 1 singles contest, while Laduca also came from behind to win a three-set match over John Storie, 4-6, 6-2, 1-0 (7), on court No. 6.
The Samford University men's tennis team will next be in action Feb. 3 at 1 p.m. (CST) as the Bulldogs travel to Atlanta, Ga., for a key nonconference matchup against the Georgia State Panthers.
Presbyterian 4, Appalachian State 3
BOONE, N.C. - Appalachian State University men's tennis suffered a tough 3-4 loss this afternoon against Presbyterian College at Deer Valley Racquet Club.
The Mountaineer got off to a rough start as both the No 1 doubles team of Zach Bost and Sebastien King and the No. 2 doubles team of Steve Karendal and Andrew McKinnon dropped their matches to the Blue Hose. The No. 3 doubles team of Steve Lake and Jan-Willem Kleynhans pulled off an 8-2 victory to give the Apps their first win of the afternoon.
In singles action, King was unable to secure the victory as he fell 7-6 and 7-5 in No. 1 singles action. Bost picked up the Black and Gold's first singles victory of the afternoon when he defeated William O'Connell 6-4, 7-6 in No. 2 singles, while Karendal defeated Rafael Berghaus 7-6, 6-4 in No. 3 singles.
Appalachian suffered its second loss in No. 4 singles, as McKinnon was defeated 6-4, 6-4 by Presbyterian College's Andrew Brigham. The Apps were down 3-2 when Saltsgaver earned an exciting 6-2 victory in the tiebreaker match to knot the score at three all.
Kleynhans battled hard in his first match for the Apps, but was unable to defeat Danny Bruce in the tiebreaker match, as Appalachian fell 4-3 to the Blue Hose.
With the loss the Mountaineers fall to 0-3 overall on the season, while Presbyterian College improves to 3-3 overall on the season. Appalachian will be back in action on Saturday, Feb. 2 when ETSU travels to High Country. The match is scheduled to start at 1 p.m.