Men’s Tennis Stuns Army with Fantastic Win; Beats Lafayette

The men’s team took advantage of their strong and skilled roster to show the rest of the league that they are true contenders in the Patriot League this year. The men finished up league play this past week as they leapt past Army and Lafayette to improve to a 4-1 record in league play.

The 11-7 men’s tennis team caught fire at the right time of the season and is now in possession of the No. 2 seed in the Patriot League Tournament, giving them the right to play No. 7 Holy Cross in the quarterfinal round on Friday at Army. After losing three of their first four matches against Fairfield (6-1), St. John’s (7-0), and Boston College (6-1), it seemed as though the Raiders would never bounce back. The men collected themselves, however, and over the course of the season managed to win a slew of matches, with victories over Boston University, Niagara University, Bucknell and Army. The Raiders managed to leg-out 4-3 victories against all of these teams during crucial points of the season.

Against Army, the men relied on their dominant singles play to take four of six matches. The singles play was accentuated by junior Michael Yassky’s phenomenal three-set victory over Donald Van Velzer (6-4, 4-6, 7-6). Senior Martin MacIntyre (6-2, 6-2), sophomore Phil Bernasek (5-7, 7-6, 6-3) and first-year Sean Spellberg (6-1, 7-6) also won scintillating matches.

“It was the biggest win in our program since 2006 when we beat Navy,” senior Martin McIntyre said. “The difference is that this year we finished the regular season strong enough to earn the two seed in the Tournament. We are looking forward to playing our best tennis of the year at the Patriot League Tournament this weekend.”

The men then defeated Lafayette with relative ease as the Raiders cruised by the Leopards 5-2. The men dominated doubles play as they swept the Leopards and took four of six singles competitions. MacIntyre lost his singles match, which has been very rare over the last four years, but a quarter of Raiders, led by junior John Nogueras , stepped up to the plate.

After disheartening losses to league rivals Lehigh and Bucknell, the women won their first two matches in the last ten as they defeated Lafayette, 4-3 and Hamilton, 6-1. First-year Alexandra Erickson played out of her shoes as she set the Raiders on the right track to victory at Lafayette. Erickson paired with senior Cameron Thaney to win a doubles match (8-1) against Rachel Rohinsky and Emily DeLuca 6-2, 4-6, 6-1. She then went on to defeat Allie Seranko in singles competition 7-5, 6-1. Juniors Elise DeRose (7-5, 6-4) and Jackie Stimmel (6-2, 4-6, 6-1) also won singles matches. Senior Erin Fenn and first-year Stephanie Brown won a doubles match (8-4) as well to help give Colgate the doubles point. The women will most likely have the fifth seed in the Patriot League Tournament, which takes place two weekends from now.

Editor’s Note: Coverage of Colgate’s 6-1 win over Hamilton took place too late for this print issue. Please check maroon-news.com this weekend for an update.