BLOOMINGTON, Minn. (csssaints.com) – The St. Scholastica men's tennis team returned to the port city of Duluth Saturday night with their second consecutive weekend sweep in a row, this time over two non-conference opponents.
To start the morning a longtime rival of CSS and former Upper Midwest Athletic Conference (UMAC) foe the Northwestern Eagles (UNW) flew into the Bloomington Bubble, where they were stopped by the Saints 5-4 in a conference-like atmosphere. The turnaround would be quick as the Saints would next square up with Simpson College out of Iowa immediately following in the afternoon session. The Saints would outwait the Storm and prevail in that one 7-2.
CSS vs UNW
Doubles
The Saints got off on the right foot when they found a pair of doubles points on courts No. 1 and No. 3 to get the dual match underway.
At No. 1 doubles the duo of Jonas Abeleda (Sydney, Australia/St Aloysius' College) and Eamon Gerrard-Stace (Brisbane, Au.) held their opponents to a pair of games, 8-2.
Next, the tandem of Reece Patten (Duluth, Minn./Duluth East HS) and Carter Anderson (Hibbing, Minn./Hibbing HS) cruised to an 8-1 victory at the No. 3 line.
To end the doubles leg of the meet the Saints would have to enter singles 2-1 as they would drop the match closely via a deciding tiebreak 7-8 (7-9) at the No. 2 position.
Singles
In singles play the Saints would be highly contested but fought on to claim the 3 singles points necessary to clinch the team victory.
At the No. 3 line Julius Tabrizi (Frankfurt, Germany/Bischof-Neumann) got past Eagles graduate student Davis Pfaff via straight sets, 6-3, 6-3.
On court No. 4 Anderson found himself in another third set superbreaker, this time prevailing with a clutch 6-3, 3-6, 10-8 victory.
At the No. 5 line Riley Versich (Kelly Lake, Minn./Hibbing HS (Itasca CC)) would wrap things up for the Saints and add the fifth team point, cruising past UNW's Griffin Jarchow 6-0, 6-3.
CSS vs Simpson
Doubles
The Saints would find themselves in a similar scenario to last Sunday against St. Olaf when they dropped two of the doubles points to the opposition Simpson heading into the singles portion of the dual match.
The No. 1 line of Gerrard-Stace and Abeleda cleaned things up nicely 8-4 to conclude their day on the first doubles court.
At the No. 2 position the Saints suffered their second No. 2 doubles loss of the day via the tiebreak, 7-8 (5-7). The pairing of Jack Onkka (Thief River Falls, Minn.) and Alex Daigneault (Agua Dulce, Calif./Hart HS) came up just short in this battle for CSS.
Singles
In singles play the Saints would take back the momentum from the Storm, winning a clean slate of all six of the singles courts.
At the No. 1 position, Abeleda would dominate by a final scoreline of 6-1, 6-0. Shortly after Tabrizi would get over the line next, winning 6-4, 6-0 at the No. 2 line. Tabrizi has now won four straight matches.
On court No. 3 Anderson battered his opponent 6-1, 6-3, and not long after Versich triumphed 6-2, 6-3 at No. 4, adding onto a team-high sixth singles win and his fourth straight match victory in a row.
Courts No. 5 and No. 6 featured two freshman victories, the first from Andy Shaffer (Buffalo, Minn.) 6-2, 6-4. To finish the double header action-packed day and end the second dual match Harper Dircks (Hopkins, Minn.) claimed his first collegiate victory amongst the singles lineup, hailing 6-2, 5-7, 10-7 at the No. 6 position.
Up Next
The Saints will now take a short hiatus from indoor play as they will now leave Minnesota with four straight dual-match victories in their pocket heading into the Florida segmentation of the schedule.The College of Saint Scholastica is next scheduled for action against Eastern Florida State College in St. Petersburg, FL on March 11th. The Saints improve to 5-4 on the season and stay at 2-3 in MIAC play until they return for the second half of the spring season.
