St. Peter, Minn. – The Gustavus Adolphus men’s tennis team secured its seventh Minnesota Intercollegiate Athletic Conference Playoff Championship with an 8-1 victory over St. Olaf College on Sunday at the Brown Outdoor Courts. The Gusties swept doubles and took five-of-six points in singles on the way to their fourth consecutive playoff crown.
With the win, Gustavus earns the MIAC’s automatic berth into the 2014 NCAA Men’s Tennis Tournament. The Gusties will be making their fourth straight and 27th total appearance in the NCAA Tournament since 1983. This year’s playoff title is the fourth for Head Coach Tommy Valentini, whose tenure began in the 2009-10 season. Gustavus is now 28-5 on the season and improves to 15-1 all-time in the MIAC Playoffs since the post-season tournament moved to the current six-team, single elimination format.
The day began with Gustavus’s No. 3 doubles team of Marcel Gyswyt (Sr., Golden Valley, Minn.) and Andres Saenz Hoyo (Fr., Cancun, Mexico) gave the Black and Gold a 1-0 lead with an 8-2 victory over Nico Gibb and Ben Carlson. Juan Luis Chu (Sr., Lima, Peru) and Joey MacGibbon (Sr., Apple Valley, Minn.) finished off Keenan Gladd-Brown and Matt Christensen 8-3 at the No. 2 spot to put the Gusties on top 2-0. Motasam Al-Houni (Jr., Tripoli, Libya) and Mya Smith-Dennis (Sr., Savage, Minn.) completed the doubles sweep with an 8-5 win over Stephen Nolan and Joey Kronzer at the top spot.
In singles play, Joey MacGibbon made short work of Ben Carlson 6-1, 6-0 at No. 3 to put Gustavus on top 4-0. Juan Luis Chu then gave the Three Crowns the decision up 5-0 with 6-1, 6-0 win over Stephen Nolan at No. 1.
Gustavus also benefited from straight-set wins by Brad Entwistle (Jr., Sioux Falls, S.D.) 6-1, 6-0 over Mike Schroeder at No. 6, Grant Leisner (Sr., Andover, Minn.) 6-1, 6-4 over Nico Gibb at No. 4, and Mya Smith-Dennis 6-4, 7-5 over Joey Kronzer at No. 2. St. Olaf’s lone point came from a Matt Christensen win over Al-Houni by the score of 6-3, 4-6, 10-3 at No. 5.
The NCAA Tournament field will be announced Monday, May 5, at 6 p.m. via a live online selection show on NCAA.com.
Fans can re-live all of the action from the 2014 MIAC Men’s Tennis Playoffs on the tournament’s home page which includes complete scores, stats, recaps, photos and more. Fans can also connect on social media through the MIAC’s Facebook page or Twitter account, using the hashtags #MIACMT and #MIACPlayoffs.