Continuing their fall season slate, the Binghamton University men’s tennis team gathered four members to compete at the Ranked Plus One Invitational hosted by the University of Virginia over the weekend. In a field consisting of 28 ranked players, including 11 who competed in the 2010 NCAA championship, BU’s own ranked competitor, senior Sven Vloedgraven, won two matches en route to a fifth-place finish in the A-2 singles bracket.
Vloedgraven, ranked 84th nationally in ITA’s preseason rankings, took on Zach Leslie of Wake Forest in the opening round. The senior wasted no time on the Demon Deacon, winning the match in two sets, 6-3 and 6-2. Blocking Vloedgraven’s road to the final was eventual A-2 singles champion Sanam Singh of UVA. Singh, Virginia’s top player in the invite largely due to his No. 13 rank, passed Vloedgraven in two matches, 6-4 and 6-2. The Bearcat bounced back to take fifth place in the bracket, beating Jorge Varon of East Tennessee State University in two sets, 6-4 and 6-2.
In A-1 singles, Bearcat junior Alexandre Haggai battled through the first round to beat UVA’s Steve Roda. Haggai overcame a 6-2 loss in the first set to sneak by in the second by a score of 7-6 and eventually sealing the deal with a 6-3 win. However, preventing Binghamton’s opportunities to advance again was eventual A-1 champion Ivan Salec of Radford. Salec took the first set from Haggai, hit a speed bump and dropped the second set, then closed the match off with a 6-4 win.
Highlighting Binghamton’s doubles play was the combination of Haggai and senior Arnav Jain. Despite being knocked from the winners bracket in the first match, the pair plowed through two rounds to win the A-3 doubles consolation championship. Haggai and Jain beat Joshua Graves and Spencer Wolf of Northwestern, 8-5, before facing a duo of Virginia Cavaliers in the finals. After going back and forth with the hosts, Haggai and Jain took the match 9-8 in a tiebreak.
Vloedgraven and junior Gilbert Wong came together to take a similar path as their teammates, advancing to the consolation doubles final in A-2 doubles. But, unlike Haggai and Jain, this couple fell to No. 41-ranked doubles squad Tommy Laine and Maros Horny of the University of Maryland in the consolation finals, 8-5.
Among other Bearcats to participate, No. 116 Jain failed to win a match in A-3 singles and Wong won a match in the consolation bracket before falling.
The Bearcats will take this weekend off and prepare for either the ITA National All-American Championship in Tulsa, Oklahoma from Oct. 7 to Oct. 10 or the Columbia Classic on Oct. 8.