Box Score 1 |
Box Score 2 FOREST GROVE, Ore. – All 13 Lewis & Clark College men's tennis players played in at least one match at the Pacific Northwest ITA Tune-Up round-robin tournament on the Pacific University campus this past weekend, and nine Pioneers finished with a .500 or better overall record.
HOW IT HAPPENED
Seniors
Matt Chio (5-0),
Bennett Gazor (5-0), junior
Wade McDermott (5-0) and sophomore
Joey Lyon (4-0) finished the weekend undefeated against players from Northwest Conference rivals Linfield University, Willamette University and host Pacific. A total of 43 men's student-athletes competed in four different pools over two days in singles, and 20 doubles teams played on Sunday.
Chio and Lyon competed in pool 'A' with junior
Kai Wills and sophomore
Noah Sutin. The four Pioneers went a combined 6-5 in the pool. Chio (3-0) and Lyon (2-0) led the way with five combined singles wins.
McDermott was joined by fellow juniors
Spencer Loucks,
Landon Cronin, and first-year
Arnav Bishnoi in pool 'B.' On Sunday, Bishnoi earned his first collegiate win in his third singles match, defeating Pacific's Toguchi 7-5, 6-2. Three of the losses by the Pioneers in pool B came down to close third-set tiebreaks as Loucks fell in his first match 10-7 in the third, and Bishnov lost his first two matches 10-8 and 11-9 in third-set tiebreaks.
Sophomores
Max Furman and
Bridger Galyardt joined Gazor in pool 'C,' and the trio earned a 6-3 record against the competition. Gazor only lost six total games in his three singles matches.
First-years
Charlie Kowatch and
Nick Moore each made their collegiate debut over the weekend. Moore earned his first win, defeating Jake Freeland from Willamette in three sets.
On Sunday, Lewis & Clark won nine of 11 doubles matches. Six of those doubles teams were from the Pacific, and the doubles teams of Furman / Gazor and Chio / Loucks each earned two wins against the Boxers.
WHO'S NEXT
The Pioneers travel to Newberg and compete Friday through Sunday at the ITA Northwest Fall Regional Tournament.
