Men’s tennis battles out spring break match-ups

By Katrina Murphy
Sports Editor

The Western Michigan University men’s tennis team kicked off spring break with a trip to Louisville, KY to take on No. 38 Oklahoma State University on Friday, February 26.

After battling point-for-point with the nationally-ranked team, the Broncos came up short, 5-2.

The Brown and Gold nearly won the doubles point as the tandem of junior Casey Cullen and sophomore Pablo Olivarez won at No. 2 doubles, 8-6, and brothers Michael and Thomas Calderone advanced to a tiebreaker at the No. 3 slot.  The Cowboys’ Maxi Kuhn and Ilija Martinoski pulled out the tiebreaker, 9-8 (3), to pick up the point for Oklahoma State.

Junior Kazuya Komada dominated at the No. 2 singles spot, defeated the nation’s No. 65 singles player, Anton Bobytskyi, 6-1, 6-2.

The Orange and Black took the next point as Michael Calderone dropped a close match at No. 1 singles to the reigning ITA National Player of the Year and No. 10 singles player, Oleksandr Nedovyesov, 6-4, 6-4.

Brad Noel tied the match for Western Michigan after defeating Kuhn at the No. 6 singles slot, 7-5, 6-1.

The winning decision was left to the outcome in the No. 3 and No. 4 singles after the Cowboys took the lead with a straight win at No. 5 singles.

Despite taking the first set over Martinoski, Olivarez dropped the next two sets, allowing Martinoski the win, 3-6, 6-2, 7-5.

Freshman Simon Blomberg also picked up the first set win against Aleksey Bessonov at No. 4, but Bessonov battled back to win 4-6, 7-6 (7-5), 6-2.

On Feb. 27, the Broncos returned to Kalamazoo to host Purdue University at West Hills Athletic Club.

Western Michigan defeated No. 69 Purdue, 4-3, for the fifth year in a row.  The Brown and Gold also snapped a four-match losing streak to nationally-ranked teams.

Blomberg defeated Purdue’s Branko Kuzmanovic 6-3, 4-6, 7-5 at the No. 4 singles slot to break a tied match and to give WMU the winning hand.

The Broncos had to fight from behind in the singles competition after dropping the doubles point.  Only the Calderone brothers picked up a win, defeating the duo of Paul Foley and Eric Ramos, 8-6 at No. 3 doubles.

Noel quickly tied the match by defeating Thomas Wilson 6-2, 6-0 at No. 6 singles while Komada defeated P.J. Rose 6-1, 7-5 at No. 1 singles.

WMU picked up their third point as Olivarez defeated Ramos at the No. 3 singles, 6-4, 6-4.

The Boilermakers came back to tie the match after a win at No. 5 and No. 2 singles, but Blomberg sealed the victory after defeating Kuzmanovic in three sets at No. 4 singles, 6-3, 4-6, 7-5.

On Feb. 28, the Broncos swept a pair of matches, 7-0, over Butler University and Bradley University at West Hills Athletic Club.

The Brown and Gold finished the day winning 17-of-18 matches to push their winning streak to three, after defeating both the Bulldogs and the Braves.

Cullen led the way for WMU after finishing 4-0 for the day.  He picked up two wins at No. 2 doubles with partner Komada over Butler, 8-4, and Bradley, 8-1.  Cullen also won 6-4, 6-3 at No. 5 singles against Butler and 6-0, 6-0 against Bradley at No. 4 singles.

Michael Calderone picked up wins against Bradley in No. 1 singles and No. 2 against Butler, while Olivarez won at No. 2 against Bradley and No. 3 against Butler.

Blomberg also picked up a win at No. 4 singles against Butler, 6-1, 6-0, and at No. 3 against Bradley, 6-1, 6-1.

Western Michigan then travelled to Corpus Christi, Texas on Friday to compete in the HEB Tournament of Champions.

The No. 64 Broncos split its opening two matches on Day One of competition after defeating the University of South Alabama, 4-2, and falling to No. 18 Texas Tech University, 4-0, during the semifinals.

Against South Alabama, the Brown and Gold took the upper hand after picking up the doubles point.

The duo of Thomas Calderone and Noel won at No. 3 doubles, 9-7, after Michael Calderone and Zeyad Montasser dropped No. 1 doubles, 8-1.  Cullen and Komada finished the comeback after picking up a 8-4 win at No. 2 doubles.

Blomberg kept up the pressure at No. 4 singles, winning 6-0, 6-2 to put the Broncos back up by two, 2-0.  Olivarez cinched the win after defeating Christian Kuehne 7-5, 6-2 at No. 3 singles.

The Brown and Gold returned to face the Red Raiders in the afternoon during semifinal play.  Texas Tech took an early lead and won the first four singles matches to advance to the championship.

Western Michigan closed out tournament play on Saturday when they matched-up against DePaul University for the second time this season.

The Brown and Gold defeated DePaul, 4-0, to earn third place on the final day of the HEB Tournament of Champions. The Broncos (12-5) took four singles wins over the Blue Demons (6-11) to finish 2-1 at the tournament overall.

Noel put Western Michigan on the board, 1-0, with a 6-0, 6-2 victory over DePaul’s Mathias Hambach at No. 6 singles.  Cullen followed close behind with a 6-2, 6-1 win over Vanja Grgec at No. 5 singles.

Michael Calderone pushed his match to three sets, but picked up his first win during tournament play after defeating Bartosz Jozwiak, 6-3, 4-6, 6-3, at No. 1 singles.  Komada clinched the win for the Broncos after defeating Matija Palinic 7-6, (6), 6-4 at No. 2 singles.

Western Michigan will resume play on March 15 when they host Chicago State University at 1 p.m. and Ferris State University at 6 p.m.  Both matches will be held at West Hills Athletic Club.

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Posted by heraldstaff on Mar 7 2010. Filed under Sports. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0. You can leave a response or trackback to this entry

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