As both the men’s and women’s tennis teams head into the homestretch of the season, both teams have their eyes set on Patriot League Championships. The men continued down the right path to victory as they defeated Bucknell 4-3 in Patriot League play. However, the women continued their subpar play as they were defeated by Bucknell 6-1. This past loss was their eighth consecutive loss and their third conference loss.

The clutch men’s tennis team pulled out a win against Bucknell thanks to stellar play in both doubles and singles matches. Senior Martin MacIntyre and junior John Nogueras defeated Ryan Sandburg and Anton Kovic, 9-8, to start the Raider dominance. The sophomore duo of Phil Bernasek and Ruslan Goussaintnikov and the tandem of junior Michael Yassky and sophomore Jamie Pellechi went on to sweep doubles play for the match. MacIntyre and Nogueras extended the Colgate lead in singles play as they defeated both of their opponents in flight one and flight two singles. MacIntyre defeated Sandburg 7-6, 6-1 and Nogueras defeated Kovic 6-3, 6-4. The Raiders went on to lose three of the next four singles matches with Yassky posting the only other win over Gregg Cohenca 6-1, 6-2. With this win the men improved to 2-1 in Patriot League play and are vying for a top-two seed in the league tournament.

On the other hand, the women’s season is spiraling out of control as they lost their third consecutive Patriot League contest. Thus far, the strong point of the women’s team has been their doubles play. However, first-year Alexandra Erickson and junior Cameron Thaney were the only duo to post a win against Bucknell. Erickson and Thaney defeated Bucknell’s Ashley Globerman and Dara Dwojewski 8-2. Thaney was the only woman to win in singles competition as she defeated Globerman 3-6, 6-2, 10-6. Junior captain Elise DeRose played a tough match as she took Tania Varela to three sets but was unable to prevail. If the women are looking to make a push in Patriot League tournament it will be pivotal that Elise DeRose and fellow captain, senior Erin Fenn, play lights-out in the remaining league matches.

The men’s last two conference matches are against league foes Army and Lafayette. Should the men manage to prevail against those teams, they will be looking at the two seed in the Patriot League tournament. As for the women, they still have three remaining matches against Lafayette, Hamilton and Binghamton, and need wins in those matches for much-needed momentum.