Boxscore
by Jimmy Chau
PORTLAND, OR.-
Following their female counterpart's lead, the Viking men take down the Pios 9-0. Opening the season against one of the most difficult opponents they will face all year, the Pios were blitzed by the big hitting of their Div. I opponent. Things looked positive very early on as the Lewis & Clark coaches looked up at the scoreboard to see 2-1 scores in the first and second doubles flights. The early optimism would quickly fade though as the more tested Vikings would roll the rest of the evening. Having already faced the likes of traditional power houses Stanford University and the University of Oregon, the Vikings would give up only ten games the entire night. George Allen and Quinn Roth-Carter were able to hold serve a couple times against the number one team of Chris Rice and Roman Margoulis but couldn't come up with much more than that. Alex Van Derschelder and Mitch Somach rolled 8-1 at the second doubles flight and Jeff Cero and Vetu Mam blanked their opponents 8-0.
Singles action would see much of the same, except at the number one spot, where Allen gave Somach all he could handle, losing 6-3, 6-3. Coming back from an overseas trip to Chile where finding competition on the clay courts was tough, Senior George Allen had to be encouraged by his first match back in the U.S. Going up against pace that he doesn't see consistently, Allen had a very tough time reading Somach's surprisingly huge serve. By night's end though, Allen would leave the court feeling good about his baseline game and his ability to match his opponent stroke for stroke once the points developed. Although there were bright spots here and there in the rest of the matches, the Vikings found it fairly easy going as they blanked the Pios in flights three through six.
The Pios have two weeks of tough training before they head to Whitworth on Feb. 18th for their next match.
