University of Minnesota Athletics
Gophers Enjoy Solid Weekend at ITA Regional
10/20/2008 12:00:00 AM | Men's Tennis
Michael Sicora and Tobias Wernet reached the semifinals of the doubles main draw to lead the Minnesota men’s tennis team at the Intercollegiate Tennis Association Regional Championships over the weekend in Columbus, Ohio.
All three Minnesota doubles teams won at least one match and lost to highly-seeded opponents, while five of the Gophers’ six singles participants in the main draw were eliminated by nationally-ranked foes.
Sicora and Wernet pulled a pair of upsets before falling to the nation’s 26th-ranked tandem of Austen and Simon Childs of Louisville 8-4 in the semifinals. The Gophers’ pair knocked off the third-seeded team of Billy Heisler and Ruan Roelofse from Illinois 9-8 with a tiebreaker win in the quarterfinals. They posted an 8-6 win over Moritz Baumann and Marek Michalicka from Wisconsin, who were ranked 39th nationally, in the previous round. In the first two rounds, they beat Matt Hansen and Ross VanderPloeg of Northern Illinois 8-5 and Kevin Hayward and Casey Cullen of Western Michigan 8-1.
Dino Bilankov and Sebastian Gallego were seeded 11th in the doubles draw and lost in the third round to Childs and Childs 8-6. They posted a first round win over Daniel Klingenberg and Ben Vasalakis of Indiana-Purdue-Indianapolis 9-7 and beat Illinois’ Jordan Knue and Abe Souza 8-5 in the second round.
Julian Dehn and Jake Annear opened with an 8-4 win over Vuk Milicevic and Jordan Nestrud of Eastern Illinois before falling to fourth-seeded Justin Kronauge and Matt Allare of Ohio State 8-2 in the second round.
In singles, Wernet reached the third round and was knocked out in a 6-3, 3-6, 6-1 three-set loss to Kronauge, who was the tournament’s top seed and ranked eighth individually. Wernet beat 19th-seeded Jose Moncada of DePaul 6-4, 6-4 in the second round after opening with a 6-4, 6-4 win over Roelofse.
Philip Arndt won his opening match over Eduardo Pavia of Ball State 7-6, 4-6, 6-3 and then lost 6-4, 6-1 to second-seeded Brian Koniecko of Ohio State, who is ranked ninth in the country.
Sicora beat Doug Matthews of Xavier 6-3, 6-3 before falling 6-2, 6-4 to Austen Childs, who is ranked 26th nationally. Gallego won his first match over Simon Childs 6-2, 6-2 and was ousted in a 6-2, 2-6, 6-3 loss to Michigan’s Jason Jung, who is ranked 78th in the country.
Bilankov lost his opening match 6-4, 6-4 to Heiser, who is ranked 70th in the country, while Dehn dropped his opener to Slavko Bijelica of Purdue 6-2, 6-4.
Players Mentioned
