SWARTHMORE, Pa.—No. 32 Swarthmore College Men's Tennis staged a late comeback Monday to edge No. 33 Rensselaer Polytechnic Institute at the Faulkner Courts on a beautiful spring afternoon. After conceding the doubles lead and five of six first sets in singles, the Garnet recovered to win three third-set battles, including the clinching point by Jiung Jung.
The 7-1 Garnet hold the program's best season-opening record since 1978 and maintain a perfect home record this year. Today's win was Swarthmore's second consecutive victory over a ranked opponent.
RPI jumped out to quick leads at first and third doubles. In the top slot, John Lathrop and Thibault Vernier dropped an 8-2 decision to the sixth-ranked doubles pair in the nation, Sebastian Castillo-Sanchez and Andrew Imrie. Freshmen Grant Dill and Stephen Wong were tight with their opponents early on, but were hampered by several early breaks of serve.
With the Engineers already holding a 2-0 advantage, Noah Cheng and Weiyi Zhu delivered a crucial break at 4-3, the first of the match. The pair consolidated on Cheng's serve and added a second break for a 7-3 lead. Several putaway volleys by Zack Ebenfeld of RPI secured a break and a hold, and the Engineers went up a fast 0-30 on Cheng's serve at 7-5. Two timely aces by Cheng closed out the Garnet's first point and avoided the doubles sweep.
RPI immediately turned on the jets in singles, winning five of the opening sets by margins of 6-2 or better. The exception was Stephen Wong at fifth singles, coasting to a 6-0, 6-0 victory in just over an hour to maintain a perfect spring singles slate without dropping a set. A simultaneous loss at first singles to the No. 9 player in Division III kept the Engineers ahead.
John Lathrop lent hope with big returns off Andrew Imrie's heavy serve to even his second singles match at a set apiece. Thibault Vernier held serve with his opponent through the entire second set, but Yudai Teruyama closed out the tiebreaker to force the Garnet to win the remaining three matches, all facing a one-set deficit.
Swarthmore's catalyst emerged at sixth singles, where John Nichols-Daly staved off match points and secured a four-deuce break receiving at 4-5 in the second set. Eddie Wu's rapid break had him serving for the match once again, but Nichols-Daly quickly reciprocated to reach the tiebreaker. After dropping the first three points, the sophomore transfer put up seven unanswered to force a deciding third.
Lathrop continued to secure opportunities to take the net away from Imrie and held a one-break lead throughout his third set, polishing off a 6-3 victory.
Nichols-Daly jumped to a 3-0 lead in the final set at sixth singles and, despite a late charge by Wu from 5-2 to win two games, never gave up his one-break advantage. Serving at 5-4, 0-30, Nichols-Daly ripped off the winning quartet of points to improve his season singles record to 7-1.
With the team match knotted at 4-4, all eyes turned to fourth singles. Jung and Abraham Yohannes of RPI had the unlikely outcome of trading bagel sets, the first to the Engineers and the second to the Garnet. Yohannes struck the first blow with a break to lead 2-1 in the third. Jung won two tight games and then raced through another pair in timely fashion. The Engineer freshman hit several quality forehands to stay alive in his service game.
After two and a half hours of play, leading in the deciding set 5-3, 15-all, Jung took a medical timeout to avoid a left quadriceps cramp. The break was short and Jung, using a modified service motion, ripped two deep groundstrokes out of the timeout to set up match point. The Yohannes return sailed long as Jung – not for the first time in his career – clinched a comeback victory for Swarthmore.
Swarthmore, in its first outdoor contest, handed the Engineers (2-1) their first defeat of the year. Swarthmore is winning singles matches at an 81% clip.
