ORLANDO, Fla. – In a power-packed tennis afternoon on Friday in Florida, the No. 21-ranked Kenyon College men’s tennis team defeated No. 13-ranked Wesleyan University while the women’s team finished a rain-postponed match with a win over Haverford, then lost to No.5-ranked Wesleyan.
The men’s battle between two top-25 teams saw the Lords upset the Wesleyan, 5-4. The Lords dropped the first four matches of the day before rattling off five consecutive singles wins to take the match.
In No. 1 doubles, Peter Anker and Ben Mitchell defeated Christian Picot and Christophe Leblanc, 8-4. Zach Lieb and Harry Portnoy came out on top of Rishil Kondapaneni and Eric Zhang, 8-3. In the final doubles match, Max Lustgarten and Clay Gaieski needed a 7-2 tiebreak win to defeat Matias Mauviel and Angelo Vidal, 8-7.
Anker returned to the court to defeat Luis Andres Platas 6-1, 6-2 to move the Cardinals one step closer to the matchup win. That point turned out to be their last as it ignited a Lords’ comeback.
Kondapaneni started things off with a 6-2, 6-4 win over Lieb. Thomas Kallarakal, playing in the No. 3 spot, won an 8-6 tiebreaker in set one to win 7-6 before putting things away with a 6-4 set two win. Zhang picked up the Lords’ third victory with a 7-6 (7-3), 6-4 win over Portnoy.
At No. 5 singles, Rakkan Audeh outlasted Lustgarten in a three-set thriller, 6-2, 4-6, 10-3. Audeh’s win forced a tie and set up a winner-take-all match at No. 6 singles between Henry Wessel and Max Lee.
Wessel took the contested first set with a 7-5 score. In set number two, Wessel defeated Lee 6-4, completing the comeback for Kenyon and securing a top-25 win for the Lords.
After rain postponed the Kenyon College women’s tennis team’s match against No. 39-ranked Haverford College on Wednesday, the Ladies and Fords resumed play on Friday. After completing their match against Haverford, the Ladies matched up against No. 5-ranked Wesleyan University.
The Kenyon Ladies, holding a 2-0 match advantage from Wednesday, started the day off with a win in No. 3 doubles. Catriona MacIntosh and Lalasa Nagireddy picked up an 8-7 win over Ellie Esterowitz and Abbey Russano with a 7-5 tiebreaker win.
Leading 3-0 going into singles play, the Ladies took care of business quickly, needing only two matches. Daria Beshentseva defeated Rachel Fitzgerald, 6-2, 6-2. Eleni Dakos clinched the match with her 6-1, 6-2 win over Russano in the No. 2 doubles spot.
Following the Ladies' win over Haverford, Wesleyan swept the Ladies, 9-0. Beshentseva and Dakos fell in the opening doubles match, 8-4, while MacIntosh and Natalie Connelly fell, 8-1. In the Ladies final doubles match, Erika Pontillo and Nagireddy lost, 8-2.
In singles play, Beshentseva turned out to be the only Ladies’ player to win a set as her match went the distance. Beshentseva lost the first set to Caitlyn Ferrante 6-1 before coming back to take the second, 7-5. In the third, Ferrante came out on top by a score of 10-5. Needing one point to complete the win, the Cardinals’ Katie Fleischman defeated Dakos, 6-4, 6-2.
