CMS Men's Tennis Falls in 5-4 Heartbreaker to Chicago for National Championship
ST. LOUIS, Mo. - Warren Pham, Advik Mareedu and Tarm Rojanasoonthon rattled off three straight-set singles wins in a span of four minutes to put the Claremont-Mudd-Scripps men's tennis team up 4-2, and the Stags felt like they were on the cusp of a national title, but after a lightning delay of over two hours, Chicago swung the momentum its way and came back with three three-set victories for a 5-4 win to earn the title at Dwight Davis Tennis Center.
CMS ends its season at 29-4 after making it to the national championship match for the first time since 2018, and winning 25 matches in a row before falling one win short of the program's third NCAA title. Chicago wins its second national championship, after taking the 2022 title for the first team national title in school history in any sport.
The Stags trailed 2-1 after doubles, with Mareedu serving out for an 8-6 win at No. 2 with Josh Kim to give the Stags one of the three points. CMS took control in singles, winning the first set on five of the six courts, and the only one where it didn't was at No. 4, where Anirudh Gupta came back to earn a split.
Pham was able to level the match at 2-2 with a 6-2, 7-6 win at No. 6 singles, taking the tiebreaker 7-5 after being down 4-2 at the changeover, but bouncing back to take five of the last six points. Four minutes later, Mareedu and Rojanasoonthon had simultaneous match points four courts apart, with Mareedu taking his first at No. 1 (6-2, 6-4) and Rojanasoonthon finishing his moments later at No. 5 (7-5, 6-2). Rojanasoonthon and Pham both went 3-0 in singles at nationals at the No. 5 and No. 6 spots, showcasing the CMS depth.
With momentum on its side, CMS had the upper hand on the remaining three courts and it felt like a national championship could be imminent when the match was halted. Ian Freer dropped the second set 7-5 for a split, but was up 2-0 in the third at No. 2 singles. Gupta had come back for a split by taking the second set 6-4, and was at 2-2 in the third, and Matthew Robinson was in a changeover at No. 3, where he had just broken serve for a 6-3, 5-4 lead.
Conditions were much different when play finally resumed, with heavy wind gusts blowing across the stadium, and the Maroons adapted more quickly after the restart and turned the momentum, never letting go once they had it. Arjun Asokumar was able to battle back for the split at No. 3 by taking the second set 7-5, and Ajer Sher came back from 0-40 to get a key hold for the Maroons at No. 5.
Gupta fought back with his back to the wall and crawled back from 5-2 down to within 5-4, but Sher was able to serve out the match to cut the deficit to 4-3. At No. 2, Derek Hsieh and Freer had an incredibly competitive final set that featured five deuce points in the final six games, but Hsieh took four of them to come back from 2-0 down after the delay to take a 4-6, 7-5, 6-3 win to level the match 4-4. Asokumar was then able to finish off the Maroons comeback with a winner into the corner on match point, taking the third three-setter for Chicago after the delay to earn the title.
CMS will have Mareedu continue on in the NCAA singles championship, while Robinson and Freer will be in the doubles championship. Freer will graduate from this year's team after a big role at No. 1 doubles and No. 2 singles, but the Stags will return everyone else as they will try to go one win further next season.
