DANVILLE, Va. – The Old Dominion Athletic Conference featured a premier match on Saturday morning, with No. 56 Averett University men's tennis squaring off versus No. 42 Shenandoah University. With clutch play late in key matches, the Cougars attained the ranked win, knocking off the Hornets 5-2.
Kicking off the festivities,
Sam Egui and
Rafael Jodas moved to 10-4 as a duo, moving Averett (12-4, 7-1 ODAC) one step closer to the doubles point by winning over Shine Tokas and Marvin Kuehnelt, 6-3.
Lucas Fiandra and
Florian Bert, only featuring for the second time as a duo this year, keyed in versus Artem Babaiev and Jovan Cirkovic to take the matches' first point, 7-5.
Madness ensued from then on.
Jaeden Mukkaladyil defeated Shenandoah's (8-6, 4-3 ODAC) Tokas to double the Cougars' lead to two, 6-3, 6-4.
Satwik Kollepalli and Dominick Suwak then went the distance fought from a set down to push the match to a third. Suwak avenged the previous sets' loss, taking the last, 6-2 to give Shenandoah its first point.
Florian Bert at No. 3 also battled to a third set against Cirkovic. This time, it was the opposing side who fought from a set back, as Cirkovic won 6-3, 6-1 down the stretch to level the contest at two. Freshman
Lucas Fiandra faced little resistance at No. 6 from Kuehnelt, moving to win number 10 by only dropping a game, and putting Averett just a point away from a massive team win.
Prabjeet Chandhok anchored the home side, and just like two of his other teammates who played a long series of matches, he followed suit versus Babaiev at No. 4. From a set down, Chandhok took the last two sets, 6-0 and 6-2 to earn his team-leading 11th singles win, and locked up the ranked victory over a perennial conference opponent.
Jodas made events even sweeter by dispatching Keith Orr, 6-4, 7-6 (7-2) to finalize the contest at 5-2.
With the win, Averett extended its all-time rivalry win streak against Shenandoah to 16. Defeating the No. 42 Hornets, the Cougars scored its first ranked victory since last spring's ODAC championship versus No. 44 Virginia Wesleyan.
One more regular season match awaits Averett, with another ranked bout versus No. 67 Randolph College at the Averett Tennis Courts next Saturday, April 26. Start time is set for 2 p.m.
