Men’s Tennis Falls 7-2 To Claremont-Mudd-Scripps, Defeats College Of The Desert 5-4 Posted on April 3rd, 2013 by Ethan Armstrong

Gustavus players at Indian Wells, Calif.

Claremont, Calif. – The Gustavus Adolphus men’s tennis team kicked off its California training trip with a 7-2 loss at the hands of No. 1 ranked Claremont-Mudd-Scripps on Tuesday afternoon at the Biszantz Family Tennis Center.  A second Gustavus team also played an exhibition match against the College of the Desert in Indian Wells at the same time.  The Gusties topped the Roadrunners in that match by way of a tightly contested 5-4 victory.

Against Claremont-Mudd-Scripps to start the day, Gustavus grabbed an early 1-0 lead after Amrik Donkena (Sr., Rochester, Minn.) and Mya Smith-Dennis (Jr., Savage, Minn.) defeated Warren Wood and Joe Dorn 8-4 at No. 1 doubles.  Wood and Dorn make up the No. 2 ranked doubles team in the West Region according to the most recent ITA Division III rankings.  Donkena and Smith-Dennis are ranked No. 1 in the Central Region.

Following Gustavus’s win at No. 1 doubles, the Stags took the remaining two points after Nikolas Marina and Zhenya Pereverzin defeated Brad Entwistle (So., Sioux Falls, S.D.) and Joey MacGibbon (Jr., Apple Valley, Minn.) 8-4 at No. 3, and Skyler Butts and Neel Kotrappa topped Tyler Johnson (Sr., West Bend, Wis.) and Grant Leisner (Jr., Andover, Minn.) 9-7 at No. 2.

C-M-S used the momentum to take five of six points in singles play.  Gustavus’s lone win came by way of a Smith-Dennis victory over Joe Dorn 6-3, 2-6, and 7-5 at the No. 2 spot.  Both Leisner and Entwistle were locked in three set battles yet fell in the final frame.

Claremont-Mudd-Scripps 7 def. Gustavus 2 | Box Score

Against the College of the Desert later in the afternoon, Gustavus took two points in doubles play after Marcel Gyswyt (Jr., Golden Valley, Minn.) and Motasam Al-Houni (So., Tripoli, Libya) picked up an 8-4 win at No. 1, and Sam Hjelm (So., North Oaks, Minn.) and Ben Halvorson (So., Englewood, Co.) earned an 8-6 victory at No. 3.

In singles, the Roadrunners took points at the No. 1, 2, and 3.  David Brown (Fr., Oakland, Calif.) and Logan Peterson (Jr., Eagan, Minn.) allowed Gustavus two points with wins at No. 5 and No. 6, respectively.  Brown won 6-3, 6-1, and Peterson won 6-2, 6-1.  The match, however, would come down to Mitchell Elofson (Fr., St. Peter, Minn.) at No 4.  After losing the first set 6-4, Elofson faced defeat down 5-0 in the second.  The rookie bounced back to take the second 7-5, then used the momentum to win Gustavus the match with a 10-6 superbreaker win in the third.

At 13-6 overall, the Gustavus men’s tennis team will face the California Institute of Technology and the University of Redlands tomorrow afternoon.  One group will travel to Pasadena to face CIT while another will head to Redlands to face the Bulldogs.