Fayetteville, Ark. - The Stetson men's tennis team (3-0) continued its unbeaten start to the 2012 season with a 7-0 victory over Oral Roberts (0-5) in a neutral site match Saturday afternoon at the University of Arkansas.
A shorthanded Oral Roberts squad that fielded just five players was no match for the Hatters in either singles or doubles. The walkover at #3 doubles left Stetson needing only one win for the team point; the Hatters left no doubt with an 8-2 win for senior Maksim Levanovich (Minsk, Belarus) and freshman Chester Espie (Auckland, New Zealand) on Court 2 and an 8-3 triumph by junior Didrik Berg (Oslo, Norway) and senior Njal Stene (Oslo, Norway) on Court 1.
Freshman Nathan Debut (Toulon, France) was the recipient of a walkover win at #6 singles, putting Stetson ahead 2-0 before the first serve of the singles proceedings. Espie quickly made it 3-0 with a perfect 6-0, 6-0 win over Matthew Prevost on Court 5 and Stene sealed the third victory of the year for the Hatters with his 6-0, 6-2 win at #2 over Parker Allen.
Berg was nearly perfect as well, beating Oscar Witzand 6-0, 6-1 on Court 3, while sophomore Hans Adrian Riseng (Oslo, Norway) and Levanovich finished off the shutout with straight set wins of their own.
The Hatters wrap up their trip to the Natural State tomorrow, facing their hosts, nationally 72nd-ranked Arkansas, at 3:00 pm ET (2:00 pm CT). GoHatters.com has a link to Live Scoring of the match.
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