The NAIA No. 1-ranked Georgia Gwinnett College men's tennis team scored its third straight 7-0 dual-match victory against NCAA Division II competition, this time defeating No. 13 Lander University (South Carolina) on Tuesday afternoon at the GGC Tennis Facility.
The Grizzlies (3-0) have a perfect 21-0 record in three matches this season.
GGC collected a quick and dominant doubles victory on the No. 1 court with the No. 2-ranked tandem of freshmen
Paras Dahiya and
Dhakshineswar Suresh winning by a 6-2 score. The remaining two doubles matches were hard fought. Senior
Federico Bonacia and junior
Alex Gurmendi clinched the doubles point, for a quick 1-0 edge, with a 6-4 triumph on the No. 3 court.
In singles, the team jumped out to a 3-0 lead after freshman
Santiago Villarruel earned a victory on the No. 6 court when an injury forced his opponent to retire from the match. Suresh then won all 12 games at No. 2 singles as the NAIA's No. 17-ranked singles player defeated Ambroise Marchard, the No. 10 regionally ranked player in Division II.
A few minutes later, Dahiya secured the match victory with a 6-4, 6-1 triumph. That improved the NAIA top-ranked singles player's mark to 3-0 this season.
The Grizzlies' remaining three points came in come-from-behind fashion.
Gurmendi, the NAIA's No. 3-ranked singles player, bounced back from dropping the opening to defeat NCAA Division II No. 29-ranked Hugo Regner on the No. 1 court. He won the second set 6-2 and maintained the positive momentum by grabbing an 8-3 lead in the deciding third-set tiebreaker. Later, three straight points from Regner got him within two points at 9-7. Gurmendi closed out the match with an overhead smash for the 4-6, 6-2, 1-0 (7) victory.
Junior
Aleksa Ciric rallied from a 6-3, 4-1 deficit at No. 4 singles to force a second-set tiebreaker against Alexandre Crepy. The No. 4-ranked Ciric then pulled out the tiebreaker by a 7-3 score. He closed out strong, winning all 10 points in the third-set tiebreaker for the victory. That improved his singles record to 3-0 on the spring season.
At No. 5 singles, No. 18-ranked senior
Leonardo Sprovieri traded 6-3 set scores with Lander's Nick Beamish. The Grizzly player won the deciding tiebreaker by a 10-4 score to complete the match sweep.
"It was a gritty performance against a good Lander team. We knew coming in that they were going to start off strong. Our focus was to play strong in doubles and then we got three quick singles points and added some gutsy three-set wins for the 7-0 victory," said Head Coach
Hannah Keeling.
Georgia Gwinnett College is scheduled to play Kansas Wesleyan University in a quarterfinal match of the NAIA Indoor Championship on Friday, February 4, from Overland Park, Kansas, starting at 7:30 p.m.
