Box Score 1 |
Box Score 2 CLARKS SUMMIT, PA (April 28, 2011) – The Penn State Berks men's tennis team finished runner-up in the North Eastern Athletic Conference (NEAC) Championship afternoon at the Birchwood Tennis Club on Thursday afternoon. (Boxscore 1) (Boxscore 2)
The Nittany Lions opened the day with a 5-2 win over Penn State Abington in the semifinal round before falling 5-0 to No. 1 seed Penn State Harrisburg in the championship, in a match much closer than the score indicates.
Harrisburg swept the doubles portion of the match to build a 3-0 cushion heading into singles play. Tim Ko and Matt Holdorf fell 9-8 after dropping the tiebreaker by a score of 7-2. Steven Roughton was leading 6-3, 2-2 in his No. 3 singles match when Harrisburg won the clinching match.
Despite coming up short of their championship dream, head coach Brian Miller and his squad were still happy with the way they played.
"I'm happy knowing that we had a chance to win the conference championship," said Miller. "It was some good games and it was good day. The guys played really hard."
In the win, Bradley Kale's 6-2, 6-2 win in the No. 6 singles match sent Berks into the title match. Roughton (No. 3 singles) was also a 6-2, 6-2 winner and Ko won a hard fought battle in first singles.
Ko and Holdorf paired up for an 8-2 win in second doubles, while Javier Quinones-Melendez and Kale were 8-1 winners in third doubles. Andrew Miller and Roughton nearly gave Berks a doubles sweep, but they were edged out 8-6 in No. 1 doubles.
The Nittany Lions will finish off the season tomorrow morning with the conference's individual tournament beginning at 8 a.m.
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