Pirates Sink Clippers 7-2
03/05/2009
Pirates Sink Clippers 7-2
Jacksonville, FL - The defending NCAA DII Men's Tennis Champion Pirates of Armstrong Atlantic State University defeated the Clippers 7-2 yesterday afternoon at the University of North Florida Tennis Complex in Jacksonville, FL. The Clippers suffered their third straight loss of the season and fall to 1-3 overall. The Pirates improve to 7-1 on the year.
Both Concordia wins came in the No. 1 position. At No.1 doubles, sophomores Alex Grubin (Belgrade, Serbia) and Richi Malobicky (Pulheim, Germany) defeated Rafael Array and Edualdo Bonet 8-3. Armstrong Atlantic took the remaining doubles points to go ahead 2-1.
In singles play, it was a showdown between the No. 1 and the No. 2 ranked players in the nation, as #2 Grubin disposed of #1 Bonet 6-3, 6-4 for the Clippers second and final point of the match. At No. 2 singles, senior Josep Molet (Sabadell, Spain) fell to Paul Bishop 6-2, 6-1. Senior Karim Belhadj (London, England) and freshman Viktor Kim (Tashkent, Uzbekistan) both lost straight set matches at No. 5 and No. 6 singles, respectively. At No. 3 singles, freshman Andrey Boldarev (Tashkent, Uzbekistan) and Mikk Irdoja split the first two sets by identical 6-3 scores before Irdoja claimed the win in the third set 6-4. The closest match of the day came at No. 4 singles, where Malobicky took the first set from Array 7-6 and lost the last two sets 6-4 and 10-8 to give the Pirates seven of the 9 points of the match.
Concordia will travel to St. Augustine, FL to take on the Saints of Flagler College. The action will begin at 2:30 PM.
