Stags Advance to Regional Final Against Santa Cruz
CMS Men's Tennis earned a 5-0 win over #22 Whitman to advance to the 3rd Round of the NCAA Team Championships. The Stags will face West Region rival UC Santa Cruz, ranked #6, who upset #4 Cal Lutheran by a 5-2 score on Thursday. CMS and UC Santa Cruz will meet for the second time this season on Friday at 1:00 PM, to determine who will advance to the final eight in Oberlin, Ohio, May 25-27.
On Thursday, CMS took an early 3-0 lead by winning at all three doubles positions. Number one team Robbie Erani (New York, NY) and Ronald Wu (Los Altos, CA) needed only one service break at 5-6, and held on to win 8-6, while CMS' #2 and #3 pairs were 8-4 winners. In the singles, senior captain Mikey Lim (Honolulu, HI) got the Stags their fourth point of the afternoon with a strong 6-2, 6-0 performance at #2 singles. Three other Stags were a game away from clinching their matches when freshman Mac Cahill (Southport, CT) got the deciding point at #6 singles.
UC Santa Cruz avenged a regular season home loss to Cal Lutheran with their 5-2 win in Claremont on Thursday. The Slugs took #1 and #3 doubles for a 2-1 lead going into the singles. With straight set wins at #1 and #2 singles, Santa Cruz built a commanding 4-1 lead. Cal Lutheran got its only singles win at #3 singles to narrow the margin to 4-2, before UCSC closed out the match with a 6-1, 6-2 win at #5 singles.
The West Regional features four of the top six teams in the West and three of the top six teams in all of Division III. Coming into the regonal, CMS and Whitman had not faced each other this season. The Stags are 2-0 against Cal Lutheran and 1-0 against UC Santa Cruz on the season, while Whitman is 0-1 against both teams. Cal Lutheran defeated UC Santa Cruz in their only previous meeting.
Schedule of Play
Thursday, May 13
11:00 AM #3 CMS def. #22 Whitman 5-0
2:00 PM #6 UC Santa Cruz def. #4 Cal Lutheran 5-2
Friday, May 14
1:00 PM #3 CMS vs. #6 UC Santa Cruz