Three in a row. Binghamton University men’s tennis team pulled off its third-straight America East championship and kept the magic alive in the best season in the history of the program. The America East champions Bearcats earned an automatic bid for the NCAA tournament and will await their seeding this evening.
The Bearcats continued to do what they have done all season: dominate their conference opponents. Binghamton head coach Adam Cohen and his squad have reached three of their four main goals this season.
‘It feels good,’ Cohen said. ‘To get to the NCAA tournament was at the top of the list. Also, getting into the national rankings was something we wanted to achieve and we did that. We wanted to do well against the Ivy League teams and we went 7-1 until we lost to the Ivy champion Columbia 4-3.’
Cohen’s final goal is to finish among the top four in the Northeast region after finishing eighth last year. He has high hopes for the end of this season.
‘It’s unofficial, but I think we should finish No. 2,’ he said. ‘It feels great accomplishing all the goals we set out to achieve.’
Binghamton will find out its first-round NCAA tournament matchup when ESPNews airs its NCAA Selection Show this evening, starting at 5 p.m. The team is planning to watch the show with its fans in the TAU Bearcat Room of the Events Center.
The Bearcats didn’t even need to play a fifth match in Sunday’s championship match, as they swept the UMBC Retrievers 4-0. This came on the heels of a 4-0 win over fourth-seeded Boston University on Saturday. Three years ago, the Bearcats began their tournament-winning ways by rallying 4-3 to defeat UMBC in the championship.
On Saturday against Boston, the Bearcats won doubles and went on to get wins from junior Sven Vloedgraven, sophomore Gilbert Wong and freshman Bastian Bornkessel. Binghamton led in all of Saturday’s unfinished matchups.
‘[Sven] has played a significant role in our success,’ Cohen said. ‘The guy has 38 wins now in singles and almost 30 doubles wins. When we win the doubles point like we did against UMBC, or for that fact anybody, I have a pretty good feeling that Sven is going to get us a W and put us up 2-0.’
Vloedgraven and Wong will be huge parts of any success the Bearcats will have in the NCAA tournament. The duo improved its doubles record to 21-4, and their individual records to 38-8 (22-3 in duals) and 34-7 (22-1 in duals), respectively.
‘Gilbert and Sven played doubles all last year [together] and had a good year,’ Cohen said. ‘Obviously they had a much better year this year. They have a comfort playing together and they know what to expect from each other.’
Cohen had similar praises for Alex Haggai and Moshe Levy.
‘They’ve done a really good job at second doubles and the same has been true at third doubles,’ he said. ‘These guys have been playing at least 75 to 80 percent of the spring season together.’
Sunday’s 4-0 win over UMBC was as dominant as Cohen had hoped. The Bearcats posted wins at doubles by Vloedgraven, junior Arnav Jain and freshman Ruben Devos.
The Bearcats rotated the sixth singles position between a pair of freshmen in Bornkessel on Saturday, and Devos in Sunday’s championship.
Jain has been strong for the Bearcats all season long, and is still unbeaten in dual matches as Sunday’s win improved him to 23-0 on the year. His 34-3 overall record is the best on the team.
The Bearcats’ lone senior, Levy, took home the tournament’s Most Outstanding Performer award. This season marks the third time Levy has helped the Bearcats reach the NCAA tournament.
‘He played well in doubles both days this weekend,’ Cohen said. ‘Throughout the season the guy has done very well for us. I think he’s only lost three dual matches. He’s been playing No. 2 pretty much the last six weeks and he’s been very good in singles and doubles. To have over 20 something wins, he had a couple matches that were suspended so he could easily have over 25 wins in singles, and in doubles he’s nearing 20 wins.’
The Bearcats have still yet to win a tournament match, but the school has never had a program with this kind of regular season success.
‘We’re anxious to find out who we play,’ Cohen said. ‘We’re certainly going to go in there with a lot of confidence. We played a good schedule and we’re coming into the tournament having won 20 matches in a row so our guys should feel confident about that. We’re certainly going to play somebody very good, but I think that our guys will certainly be up to that challenge. We’re excited to be in the tournament again and represent Binghamton and the America East Conference.’
‘ Scott Sonne contributed to this report.