(Johnson City, Tenn.) ? The No. 2 seed Stetson men's tennis team advanced to the Atlantic Sun Conference Tournament finals with a 4-0 win over No. 6 Belmont Saturday afternoon. Stetson pulled out several tightly played matches to set up a Finals showdown with No. 1 ? and host school ? East Tennessee State on Sunday.
"We played another excellent match against the reigning A-Sun champion," head coach Pierre Pilote said. "This was a total team effort. We had the lead in all remaining matches, as we did yesterday. Filip Kricka was actually playing a match point to win when Joey Jones beat him to it."
Stetson captured the doubles point with wins at No. 1 (Marcus Echtler and Filip Kricka) and No. 3 (Hicham Laalej and Peter Dzuba).
Freshman Danai Stamp rolled through his No. 6 singles match with a 6-3, 6-0 victory over Zach Zola. A-Sun Player of the Year Hicham Laalej gutted out a tough 6-3, 6-4 victory over Alex Gillott at the No. 1 spot and Joey Jones punched Stetson's ticket to the finals with a 7-5, 6-1 decision over Ignacio Gesto.
The Hatters will face the Buccaneers for the A-Sun Championship at 1:00 p.m. on Sunday.
"The team worked extremely hard this year to get to this position," Pilote said. "Now with an opportunity to make the NCAA Championships, I expect another outstanding performance from them."
Results
Stetson University vs. Belmont University
4/21/2007 at Johnson City, Tenn.
Stetson University 4, Belmont 0
Doubles
No. 1 Echtler/Kricka (Stetson) def. Rocha/Rodriguez (Belmont) - 8-6
No. 2 Jones/Boulanov (Stetson) vs. Gesto/Gillott (Belmont) - DNF
No. 3 Laalej/Dzuba (Stetson) def. Abreu/Zola (Belmont) - 8-3
Singles
No. 1 Hicham Laalej (Stetson) def. Alex Gillott (Belmont) - 6-3, 6-4
No. 2 Marcus Echtler (Stetson) vs. Javier Rodriguez (Belmont) - DNF
No. 3 Filip Kricka (Stetson) vs. Fausto Rocha (Belmont) - DNF
No. 4 Serguei Boulanov (Stetson) vs. Felipe Abreu (Belmont) - DNF
No. 5 Joey Jones (Stetson) def. Ignacio Gesto (Belmont) - 7-5, 6-1
No. 6 Danai Stamp (Stetson) def. Zach Zola (Belmont) 6-3, 6-0
