Ithaca Earns Top Seed at Men's Tennis Regionals
Saratoga Springs, N.Y. - The Ithaca men's tennis team will compete this weekend in the USTA / ITA Northeast Regionals hosted by Skidmore at its on-campus facility and Saratoga Springs Maple Ave. Middle School. Singles play will consist of a 64-person bracket, and 32 doubles teams will compete for the doubles championship. There will be no consolation matches. Fans can track tournament results at Skidmore's tournament site.
Ithaca's first doubles team of senior Josh Rifkin (Homestead/Ft. Wayne, Ind.) and junior Jimmy Newton (Florida Virtual School/Englewood, Fla.) is the tournament's top seed. Rifkin will look to defend his doubles title, as he won the tournament with 2010 graduate Taylor Borda last year. The duo advanced to the ITA Small College National Championships, where they finished third. Rifkin and Newton are 9-1 on the year and have already claimed doubles titles at the Middlebury and St. Lawrence tournaments.
Rifkin is also seeded third in the singles bracket, and Newton was placed among the group of players seeded ninth through 16th, which were listed alphabetically and placed by random draw in the bracket.
Sophomore Josh Berggrun (Orange/Moreland Hills, Ohio), junior Dan Levine (Monroe-Woodbury/Highland Mills) and junior Mike Muraco (Fayetteville-Manlius/Manlius) will also compete in singles play for Ithaca. In doubles competition, Berggrun and Muraco are entered and will face the tournament's second-seeded team in the opening round.