The Virginia Wesleyan men's tennis team played their first conference match of the 2024-25 season against Washington and Lee, the defending ODAC champions. Despite strong efforts at every spot, the Marlins fell 0-7.
Division III tennis now follows a Division I and II scoring format of seven points per match. Doubles is played first, and one point is awarded to the team that wins the best of three doubles matches. Singles play follows where six points are awarded.
Doubles was highly contested with the Marlins taking early leads at the #1 and #3 lines. The Generals won at #2 over
Tudor Vlad and
Alen Curovic with a score of 6-3.
Sebastien Muller and
Hovo Madanyan rushed to a 5-2 lead at #1 against Will Kistler and Evan Erb of Washington and Lee. The Marlin duo earned a match point at 5-3 but could not close. Kistler and Erb won the set in a tiebreaker to secure the doubles point for the Generals.
The Rullan Zarraga brothers led their doubles match at #3 until the end as the Generals edged past them 7-5.
The Generals won in straight sets at #4 and #1 singles, which extended their lead to 3-0.
Hovo Madanyan's 6-4, 6-2 loss at #6 against Jake Vo clinched the match for Washington and Lee. Rafael Rullan gave his opponent a battle at #2 but lost in a close 6-4, 6-3 match.
Sebastian Muller lost the first set 6-3, but managed to win the second by the same score at #3 singles. The match was decided by a ten point tiebreaker in which Muller was outlasted by his opponent.
The final match on was
Alen Curovic against Sahil Arora at the fifth line. Curovic dominated the first set 6-1, but Arora managed to reverse the momentum and win the second set 6-2. Since the match had not yet been decided after the second set finished, a full third set was played. Curovic fell short in the contest by a score of 7-5.
The Marlins will continue competition tomorrow at 3 p.m. in a scrimmage at Chowan University.
