Oct. 17, 2003
EUGENE, Ore - The Santa Clara University men's tennis team continued its fall season today by opening play at the Intercollegiate Tennis Association Regional, hosted by the University of Oregon at the Student Tennis Center in Eugene.
Gernot Fischer, seeded eighth in the singles bracket, won his opening match over Gonzaga's Robert Penney 6-1, 6-1. Bronco teammate Eric Kochanski also won his match, besting Gonzaga's Brett Womack 6-3, 6-1. In the Round of 32 on Saturday, Fischer will face Dino Ferrari of Saint Mary's, while Kochanski will take on ninth-seed Tyler Browne of California. Six other Broncos will participate in the consolation singles draw.
In doubles, Fischer and Kochanski paired together for an 8-5 victory and will continue in that draw on Saturday as well.
"We ran into some tough matches today, but there's a lot of tennis left in the weekend," SCU head coach George Husack said. "We'll get after it again tomorrow."
Nine schools and 64 players are entered for the four-day tournament, including four top-60 teams: No. 3 Stanford, seventh-ranked California, No. 12 Washington and 59th-ranked Oregon. The event also includes Hawaii, and West Coast foes Gonzaga, Portland and Saint Mary's. Individually, eight top-100 ranked singles players and one top-35 ranked doubles tandem are entered.
Singles bracket play is double elimination (with players moved to the consolation bracket after their first loss), and doubles play is single-loss elimination. The singles finalists and doubles champion from this weekend's event will earn spots in the November 6-9 ITA National Intercollegiate Indoor Championships at the University of Michigan. Across the nation, 17 ITA Regional Championships for NCAA Division I will be held the last two weekends of October, and more information about the ITA is available at www.itatennis.com.
The event continues through Monday. The Broncos will close out the fall season at the Southern California Intercollegiate November 5-9.
Singles, Round of 64
(9) Daniel Chu (WASH) def. Francisco Zepponi (SCU) 6-4, 6-1
(8) Gernot Fischer (SCU) def. Robert Penney (GON) 6-1, 6-1
Eric Kochanski (SCU) def. Brett Womack (GON) 6-3, 6-1
Thabani Sithole (PORT) def. Ted Blosser (SCU) 6-4, 6-1
(6) Alex Slovic (WASH) def. Ben Hidalgo (SCU) 7-6, 6-0
(4) Balazs Veress (CAL) def. Taylor Bedilion (SCU) 6-3, 6-2
Martin Marechal (SMC) def. Bobby Rasmussen (SCU) 7-6, 6-1
(9) Roman Borvanov (PORT) def. Kevin McQuaid (SCU) 6-0, 6-2
Doubles, Round of 32
Leivent/Minato (CAL) def. Rasmussen/Zepponi (SCU) 8-6
Felsenthal/Ricks (WASH) def. Bedilion/McQuaid (SCU) 8-4
(5) Chu/Weiss (WASH) def. Hidalgo/Blosser (SCU) 8-4
Fischer/Kochanski (SCU) def. King/Pino (ORE) 8-5