April 18, 2012
Final Stats - Rider | Final Stats - Marist
Bronx, N.Y. -
The Fordham University men's tennis team had a busy day today, playing a pair of matches with two different results. In the first match, the Rams blanked Rider University, 7-0, while in the second, the Rams couldn't overcome the loss of two players due to injury and were upended by Marist College, 5-2.
With the split, the Rams go to 17-10 on the year, the most wins for a Fordham men's tennis team since the 1995-96 squad went 18-3.
Individually, freshman Srikar Alla finished the year with a 23-9 singles mark while sophomore Kuba Kowalski and freshman Mischa Koran also won more than 20 singles matches, with Kowalski compiling a 21-9 record and Koran a 20-6 singles mark. The three became the first Fordham players to win more than 20 singles matches in a season in school history (previous mark was 17 set by Guy Gebbia and John Cerga in 1995-96).
In the Rider win, Fordham opened the match by taking the doubles point, winning all three doubles matches. Alla and Max Peara got things started with an 8-0 win over Rollie Malfitano and Mike Kulpinski at first doubles and Peder Gram and Eli Plangger followed with an 8-1 win over Ryan Carpenter and Drew Laverty at the second position. Michael Puntillo and Luke Maloney made it a clean sweep for the Rams with an 8-3 win over Mike Gershon and Sean Sweeney at third doubles.
The Rams then won the match by winning all six singles matches, five in straight sets and one when the Rider player retired with injury. Gram picked up the first singles point for Fordham, wining the first set, 6-0, and leading in the second, 2-0, when Carpenter retired. Puntillo made it 3-0, defeating Kulpinski, 6-0, 6-0, at fourth singles while Andriy Kulak clinched the match when he defeated Mike Gershon by the same score at fifth singles. Plangger made it 5-0 with a 6-0, 6-1 win over Sweeney at sixth singles while Alla followed with a 6-2, 6-2 win over Malfitano at the first spot. Peara closed out the scoring with a 6-1, 6-3 victory over Laverty at second singles.
In the Marist match, the Red Foxes took a 1-0 lead by winning both of the completed singles matches. Dalen Klassen and Billy Bishop started with an 8-3 win over Gram and Plangger at third singles while Matt Himmelsbach and Matteo Giudici clinched the doubles point for Marist with an 8-4 win over Kowalski and J.J. Tauil at first doubles.
In singles play, Kowalski evened the match a 1-1 with a 6-3, 6-4 win over Lorenzo Rossi at first singles. But Marist clinched the win victories in third through sixth singles. Bishop started the run with a 6-3, 6-4 decision over Kulak at sixth singles and Joseph Dube followed with a 6-1, 6-0 win over Gram at the fourth position. Klassen clinched the win for the Red Foxes with a 6-0-, 6-3 win over
Jan Krouham at fifth singles and Will Reznek made it 5-1 for Marist with a 6-4, 6-5 victory over Peara at third singles.
Alla closed out the match picking up a point for the Rams at second singles. He dropped the first set to Himmelsbach, 6-3, before battling back to win the second, 7-5. Alla then controlled the tiebreaker, never trailing in a 10-6 win.
