Stevens Ends NCAA Run in Round of 16 with 5-1 Loss to No. 3 Amherst
Mark Becker
Box score
LONGMEADOW, Mass. (May 11, 2013) – Freshman
Matthew Heinrich (Hendersonville, Tenn.) and senior
Chris Rosensteel (East Windsor, N.J.) padded their NCAA Individual Championships resume with an 8-6 first doubles victory as the Stevens Institute of Technology men’s tennis team’s NCAA Championship run ended with a 5-1 loss to No. 3 Amherst College in the Round of 16 on Saturday morning.
The Ducks end their season having advanced farthest in the NCAA Championship in program history and one win shy of the all-time program record of 18 (set in 2009-10) with a 17-8 record, with all eight losses coming at the hands of national top-27 opponents. Stevens picked up its first-ever wins over ranked opponents in No. 30 The College of New Jersey and No. 22 University of Mary Washington in the Second Round while shattering the individual records books despite playing by far their most difficult schedule ever, which included 10 top-30 opponents.
Heinrich and Rosensteel
will continue their individual seasons as a doubles pairing at the NCAA Individual Championships, which will take place in Kalamazoo, Mich. from Thursday, May 23 through Saturday, May 25.
NCAA Individual Championships
Amherst immediately showed why the Lord Jeffs are ranked No. 3 in the nation, getting breaks at second and third doubles and going up 5-0 and 6-1 before long. Heinrich and Rosensteel meanwhile held serve at ones before going up 5-2 on back-to-back breaks, which seemed to motivate the Ducks’ other two pairings as Stevens began to fight back on both courts. Senior
Derek Smith (Boise, Idaho) and freshman
Tyler Tisdale (Grapevine, Texas) took another game to make it 7-2 at threes before ultimately falling, 8-2, while freshman
Ben Foran (Whitefish Bay, Wis.) and senior
Shota Tasaki (Greenwich, Conn.) stormed back at twos, getting back-to-back breaks of their own to make it 7-4 and fighting off match point before finally bowing out, 8-4.
Meanwhile, Heinrich and Rosensteel held serve at ones to take a 6-2 lead but were broken back by Amherst’s top duo of senior Mark Kahan and freshman Michael Solimano. The Ducks held serve once again to come within one game of taking the match, which they locked up on a second match point after fighting off break point.
Down 2-1 as singles play began, the Ducks fell into a deep hole early as the Lord Jeffs took quick one-set leads at third and sixth singles. Far from out of it, however, the Ducks got early breaks from Rosensteel and Foran at second and fourth singles while Heinrich and Smith stayed on serve at #1 and 5.
Heinrich and Rosensteel were broken shortly after at first and second singles, with Rosensteel going on to drop the first set, 6-2, but Heinrich came right back with a break of his own against the No. 1 singles player in the Northeast region in junior Joey Fritz.
While Tisdale and Smith were closed out at fifth and sixth singles, respectively, to put Amherst within one point of clinching the match, the remaining Ducks began their last stand. Heinrich took the tiebreaker over Fritz at first singles, 7-6 (1), after rallying from being down set point, and Foran locked up the one-set lead over Northeast No. 23 freshman Ben Fife at #4, 6-4, while Rosensteel got another early break to take a 4-1 lead over the No. 3-ranked player in the Northeast in senior Mark Kahan at second singles.
Unfortunately for the Ducks, they would not get the chance to play things out as Tasaki bowed out to the No. 4-ranked player in the region in freshman Andrew Yaraghi at #3 to give Amherst the clincher at 5-1, despite Stevens looking well capable of making it a 6-3 or even 5-4 decision.
Rosensteel and Tasaki end their careers as the first- and second-most successful doubles players in program history, having won 80 and 73 matches, respectively (many together as a pairing over their first three seasons). Rosensteel lifted the program record for career combined wins (singles and doubles) to a lofty 161, topping Assistant Coach Arik Zeevy’s previous mark of 134, which Tasaki fell just one win short of, with a 133 career victories. Rosensteel also holds the singles mark with 81 wins, topping Zeevy’s 68, while Tasaki ranks third all-time with 60. The Ducks’ captain also tied for the fourth-best career win percentage at singles with an 81-24, while Heinrich’s 24-5 record (.828) now ranks third all-time.
Several Ducks set single-season marks as well, with Heinrich and Rosensteel taking sole possession of first place on the all-time doubles pairing list with 21 victories. The duo’s win percentage also ranks fifth all-time, while Heinrich’s overall doubles win percentage of .813 (with Tasaki in the fall season) ranks third. Heinrich’s 26 total doubles victories this year are the most ever in a single season, while Rosensteel’s 22 and Tasaki’s 21 rank second and third in history.
Heinrich also becomes the all-time career doubles win percentage leader, while Tasaki and Rosensteel rank third (.753) and fourth (.725), while the doubles pairing of Heinrich and Rosensteel ranks first all-time with an .875 win percentage, with Foran and Tasaki ranking third (.750) and Smith and Tisdale coming in at seventh (.647). Heinrich and Rosensteel also tied for second in single-season singles wins, with 24 each (Rosensteel is the all-time leader with a 27-1 record in 2009-10). Head Coach Steve Gachko finishes his eighth season as the program’s winningest coach, with 121 career victories, and a .708 win percentage, which ranks first all-time among those who coached more than 26 total matches.
Amherst sub-regional
First Round – Thursday, May 9
TCNJ def. Babson 5-1
Stevens def.
Baruch 5-0
Second Round – Friday, May 10
No. 3 Amherst def. TCNJ 5-0
Stevens def. No. 22 Mary Washington 5-4
Third Round – Saturday, May 11
No. 3 Amherst def. Stevens 5-1