Elmira and Ithaca Get Road Wins
ELMIRA 8, Houghton 1 Box Score
The Elmira College men's tennis team snapped their three-match losing streak in convincing fashion, defeating Houghton College 8-1. With the win, EC moves to 6-7 on the season, leaving the Soaring Eagles one win short of matching last season's total and two wins shy of reaching the most wins any Elmira men's tennis team has had in at least 12 seasons.
Elmira got off to a strong start, sweeping all three doubles matches. The third doubles team of
Pavle Vashakidze '16 and
Scott Ferron '16 were off the court first, cruising to an 8-2 victory.
Satchal Waters '16 and
Austin Mansell '16 followed shortly after defeating their opponents 8-3 at second doubles.
EC's first doubles team of
Keith Bujak '15 and
Sam Pine '14 were not having as easy a time as Houghton's first doubles team of Brennan Campbell and Matt James were providing quite the test. The match was on serve until 6-5 when EC earned an important break, putting the ball on Pine's racket serving for the match at 7-5. Pine's serve would be broken, but EC would be resilient and break the Highlanders again for the 8-6 win.
The Purple and Gold had much of the same success in singles play, winning five of the six matches on court. Ferron took care of business at sixth singles, relinquishing just one game en route to the 6-0, 6-1 victory. Waters followed with a near identical 6-0, 6-2 win at fifth singles, clinching EC's sixth victory of the season.
Mansell ran into some early troubles at fourth singles, falling behind 5-2 in the opening set. But the sophomore would settle into a rhythm and rattle off five straight games to take the first set 7-5. Mansell would have no troubles in the second set, winning 6-2. Bujak put the Soaring Eagles ahead 7-0 with a 6-0, 6-1 victory at second singles, leaving just Pine and Vashakidze on court.
Pine took advantage of an early break in the first set to win it 6-3, but it was not until Pine broke his opponent at 5-5 that he would gain the advantage he needed. Pine held at love to close out the 6-3, 7-5 win. Vashakidze was not so fortunate, however, as he would lose in three sets. Vashakidze won the first set 6-4, but would drop set number two 6-3, forcing a third set tiebreaker. After falling in a 4-2 hole, the sophomore would rally to take the 5-4 lead in the first-to-10 tiebreaker, but Vashakidze would not capitalize on his momentum as he would fall 10-6.
ITHACA 7, Alfred 2