Box Score The Chicago State men's tennis team was eliminated from the 2022 Western Athletic Conference men's tennis tournament with a 4-0 loss to New Mexico State Friday morning at the Beaumont Municipal Tennis Center in Beaumont, Texas. The Cougars entered the tournament as the No. 6 seed, facing the No. 3 Aggies who owned a conference regular season win over Chicago State. New Mexico State advances and will face No. 2 Abilene Christian on Saturday, April 23.
The Aggies earned the doubles point with wins at No. 1 and 3, leaving
Jesus Perez Plaza and
Jakub Zamorski on the court at No. 2 tied 5-5 and unfinished. NMSU jumped out to a fast start in singles, earning first-set wins in each of the six matches and earned second-set wins at No. 6, No. 4 and No. 5 to close out the team victory.
Pedro Alvarez and Perez Plaza had second-set leads in their respective matches and
Jakov Suler was tied 5-5 when the match ended.
"The guys really fought this morning," head coach
Jack Barton said. "I thought during singles they were going to run away with the match because they came out quick, but we stayed composed. The matches I thought would end first, didn't, and the ones that ended first they really tried to make a push, but NMSU had just enough to hold us off. Overall, this was a great effort by the guys. We played hard. There were a lot of things that they accomplished that were program firsts and they should be proud of the season they had."
Freshman
Hugo Hidalgo Vega led the Cougars with 12 match victories this season and most WAC singles wins with four. Sophomore
Pedro Alvarez, who was named First Team All-WAC Singles for the second consecutive season, had 10 wins with nine of those at No. 1 singles. The duo of Alvarez and
Javier Sanchez Pradillo led the team in singles victories with nine and were 7-8 at No. 1 while
Jesus Perez Plaza and
Jakub Zamorski were 8-7 and
Max Sandoval and
Jakov Suler were 7-4.
Chicago State University vs New Mexico State University
2022 WAC Men's Tennis Tournament
4/22/2022 at Beaumont, Texas
(Beaumont Municipal Tennis Center)
New Mexico State 4, Chicago State University 0
Singles competition
1. Louis Menard (NMSU) vs.
Pedro Alvarez (CSUM) 6-2, 4-5, unfinished
2. Martin Simecek (NMSU) vs.
Jakov Suler (CSUM) 6-3, 5-5, unfinished
3. Corey Clarke (NMSU) vs.
Jesus Perez Plaza (CSUM) 6-3, 4-5, unfinished
4. Itay Feigin (NMSU) def. J Sanchez Pradillo (CSUM) 6-0, 6-4
5. Gijs Akkermans (NMSU) def.
Hugo Hidalgo Vega (CSUM) 6-3, 6-4
6. Jordy Visser (NMSU) def.
Jakub Zamorski (CSUM) 6-3, 6-2
Doubles competition
1. Louis Menard/Jordy Visser (NMSU) def. J Sanchez Pradillo/
Pedro Alvarez (CSUM) 6-2
2. Corey Clarke/Gijs Akkermans (NMSU) vs.
Jesus Perez Plaza/
Jakub Zamorski (CSUM) 5-5, unfinished
3. Martin Simecek/Itay Feigin (NMSU) def.
Jakov Suler/
Max Sandoval (CSUM) 6-2
Match Notes:
Order of finish: Doubles (3,1); Singles (6,5,4)
About Chicago State
Chicago State University Athletics is comprised of 15 intercollegiate teams involving over 150 student-athletes that compete in basketball, cross country, golf, soccer, tennis, indoor and outdoor track and volleyball. CSU held memberships in the National Association of Intercollegiate Athletics (NAIA) and NCAA Division II before transitioning to NCAA Division I in 1994. Melvin Bland was the first CSU student-athlete to gain NAIA All-American status in 1974 as a wrestler. Fred Evans became the first black swimmer ever to win a national championship in 1975. In 1991, the Chicago State women's tennis team became the first all-black college team to amass an unbeaten season at the NCAA level. CSU's women's basketball team earned a spot in the 2011 Women's Basketball Invitational and CSU's men's basketball team won the 2013 Great West Conference Tournament title, also making an appearance in the CollegeInside.com Postseason Tournament (CIT). The Men's Outdoor Track & Field 4x100-Meter Relay team were 2019 Honorable Mention All-Americans and WAC Champions. Their feat marked the first time the Chicago State's men's track & field program was represented at the national meet. Chicago State volleyball recorded a historic season in 2021, with Yanlis Feliz becoming CSU's first volleyball All-American and head coach
Tony Trifonov earning selection as WAC Coach of the Year. During that same season, three different CSU teams earned victories over Big Ten opponents with men's soccer beating Northwestern, women's basketball upending Wisconsin and volleyball, which established a school record 17 wins and hosted a post-season volleyball tournament for the first time in program history, swept Indiana in Bloomington.
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