FLUSHING, N.Y. – Playing in the first-ever Central Atlantic Collegiate Conference-East Coast Conference Men's Tennis Final Saturday evening inside the Queens College Indoor Tennis Bubble, the #36/#2 Queens College men's tennis team welcomed the #42/#1 Rams of Thomas Jefferson University to town to determine the intra-league Automatic Bid winner to the NCAA Men's Tennis Tournament.
Matching up against the Rams for the second time this season and looking to avenge the early season loss of 4-3, it would be a thrilling doubles affair on all three courts before the #1 doubles senior pair of senior
Roni Rikkonen (Tampere, Finland) and
Omar El Shehawey (Cairo, Egypt) earned a comeback victory to clinch the doubles point. The Knights would complete the sweep with singles victories at courts #4 to #6 to earn the victory to the final score of 4-0.
With the win, the Knights improved to 16-6 overall on the year.
Doubles
Queens began the doubles action on a strong note as the #2 doubles duo of sophomore
Lucas Foix Sotos (Javea, Spain) and senior
Cameron Henricy (Las Palmas, Spain) defeated Mario Antonio and Johary Rabetrano to the score of 6-2 to put the Knights up 1-0.
The #3 pair of senior
Francisco Gonzalez (La Plata, Argentina) and freshman
Tim Andersson (Linkoping, Sweden) would trail 5-2 against Antonio Mateos Melenchon and Jules Thibault before the Queens pair fought back to make it 5-4. But it would be the Rams pair that would earn the doubles match to the final score of 6-4 to tie the action at 1-1 and shift attention to the #1 court.
At #1 doubles the pair of Rikkonen and El Shehawey trailed 4-1 against Hannibal Borg and Enrique Soto Ballester before the Knights duo fought back to tie the match at 5-5 and would even take a 6-5 lead. But the Rams duo would force the tiebreaker to determine who takes a 1-0 lead into singles.
In a battle between two evenly sides, both sides traded the tiebreaker points before the Rams duo took a 5-3 lead and were just two points from clinching the doubles points. But the Knights senior pair would dig deep as they went on to earn a 7-6
(9-7) match victory and put Queens up 1-0 heading into singles play.
Singles
Queens wasted no time in taking a commanding lead of 3-0 with singles victories at #5 and #6 courts. Freshman
Noah Gauthier (La Colle-sur-Loup, France) would make quick work of Rabetrano with a 6-1, 6-0 two-set victory at #6 singles before El Shehawey earned a 6-2, 6-2 two-set victory over Melenchon at #5 singles.
Down to the final four singles matches, Queens would hold the advantage earning the first set victory at #1 and #4 singles as Rikkonen earned a back and forth first set victory over Borg to the score of 7-6
(7-3), while Foix Sotos earned a 6-3 first set victory over Ballester at #4 singles.
While at #2 and #3 singles, Henricy fell to the score of 5-7 at #2 singles against Antonio and rookie Andersson fell behind with a first set loss of 4-6 at #3 singles against Thibault.
But as Borg and Ballester earned second set victory over Rikkonen and Foix Sotos, the Queens duo of Henricy and Andersson earned second set victories to set up a thrilling final four matches.
But in the end, Foix Sotos would close out the match over Ballester earning a three-set victory to the final score of 6-3, 2-6, 6-4 as Queens clinched the Automatic bid to the big dance.
Next Serve
Head coach
Somadi Druker and the Knights have clinched the automatic bid to the NCAA Men's Tournament and will make their 22
nd straight appearance in the Big Dance set to begin on May 13. More details will follow on Monday (May 6) evening.
For the latest news on Queens College Athletics, follow the Knights at queensknights.com or via social media on Facebook (Queens College Athletics), Twitter (@QCKnights), Instagram (qcknightsny), qcmtennis (@qcmtennis)
