The Stetson men's tennis team defeated Lipscomb to remain
undefeated on the season Saturday at the Mandy Stoll Tennis Center. The Hatters
(10-0) defeated the Bisons (3-8) by a score of 4-3, improving to 2-0 in
Atlantic Sun Conference play.
"Lipscomb gave us everything they had today, playing their best
match to date," Stetson Director of Tennis Pierre Pilote said. "I don't
remember ever having such a young squad in our singles line-up but they played
like veterans today."
Freshman Laurynas Antropikas and senior Hans Adrian Riseng
opened doubles play by cruising to an 8-4 win at the number one position. After sophomores Chester Espie and Nathan
Debut fell for the first time as a doubles pair, losing 8-4 at the number three
position, it came down senior Didrik Berg and freshman Simon Julin.
The duo, who were an undefeated 4-0 coming in to Saturday's
match, led Stuart Tierney and Miguel Cortez from the start, but the Bison pair
never gave up. They came back to tie the
match at 7-7 before Berg and Julin won two straight games to earn the 9-7
victory and give the Hatters a 1-0 lead after winning the doubles point for the
fifth straight match.
As singles play began both team picked up an early victory
as Debut won 6-2, 6-2 at the number six position, and Lipscomb's Daniel
Hernandez handed freshman Cahit Kapukiran his first loss of the season, winning
6-2, 6-2 at number three to make it 2-1 in favor of the Hatters.
After Stuart Tierney topped freshman Egor Panyushkin 7-5, 6-0
at number four singles to tie the match at 2-2, Julin put the Hatters back on
top 3-2 with a 6-4, 6-4 victory at number two to improve to 10-0 in singles
this season.
With two matches left to be finished, both Antropikas and
Espie were in third sets with a chance to clinch the victory. The former, playing number one singles for
the first time, eventually came out victorious, 6-3, 0-6, 6-3 to secure the win
and keep the Hatters undefeated at 10-0.
Miguel Cortez topped Espie 6-4, 3-6, 6-2 to snap the sophomore's record
setting streak of 21 straight wins.
Stetson will now prepare for a non-conference match against
#17 Drake on Monday. The match is
scheduled for 2:30 p.m. at the Mandy Stoll Tennis Center.
"To be 10-0 going into our Drake match is fantastic," Pilote
said. "At number 17, Drake will be the
highest ranked team we have ever hosted at Stetson."
