SANTA CLARA, Calif. – The Santa Clara men's tennis team accomplished redemption Saturday afternoon, paying back the University of San Francisco with a 4-3 road victory after falling to the Dons by the same token earlier this season.
Led by a doubles point victory and a three-set singles clincher from Robert Seby, Santa Clara (10-10, 3-3) broke a two-match slide in West Coast Conference action to improve its seeding for the upcoming league championships.
"It's always great to get a win on the road in WCC play," said head coach Derek Mills. "I think in the end it was our best freshmen against there's and our freshmen won."
That freshman victory came in the form of a three set marathon match between Seby and Ryan Marker. Despite falling behind after the first set, Seby clawed his way to a 7-5 victory in set number two. Starting to feel the momentum, Seby found his groove and cruised to a 6-0 rout in the final set to earn his 10th dual match victory of the season.
"It came down to Seby's match in singles and he was able to come back," said Mills. "I'm very proud of the performance he put in today."
Prior to Seby's heroics, Santa Clara and San Francisco (4-18, 1-6) were locked in a tightly-contested match from the opening serve in doubles. Ashot Khacharyan and Max Heerinckx opened up the scoring with a 6-2 decision on Court 3 but the Dons would respond with a 6-3 winner on Court 1 to square things up at 1-all. Playing together for the second time this season, Kamran Khan and Andrew Gu continued their undefeated start with a 7-6 victory at the No. 2 spot to give the Broncos a point that would prove to play an important role in the match.
"I thought we played good doubles," said Mills. "They guys were locked in."
Transitioning to singles, the Dons and Broncos would trade blows. In the first match to finish, Connor Garnett was upended 7-5, 6-3 but Gu was able to lift the Broncos next door on Court 3, handling Thomas Takemoto 6-2, 6-3. Tynan Maguire held Khan winless for the second match in a row to even the match again at 2-all.
In another straight set finish, Khacharyan moved up the all-time Santa Clara singles wins list with his 6-4, 7-6 victory over USF senior Nils Skajaa at the No. 1 spot. However, Woravin Kumthonkittikul was able to keep the Dons alive with a 6-3, 7-6 win over Sebastien Mathieu, pushing the Santa Clara sophomore's record to 3-11.
The Broncos continue their three-match road swing with two tests next weekend against Pepperdine University and Loyola Marymount University.
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