Men’s tennis earns win

By Darwin Minnis

Men’s tennis beat Toledo (9-16, 2-1 MAC), 4-3, Saturday at NIU in its third conference game of the season.

With this win, the Huskies (17-5, 3-0 MAC) are the only undefeated MAC team remaining and own at least a portion of the regular season championship.

A win this weekend against Buffalo will give NIU sole ownership of the regular season championship. If the Huskies lose, Toledo will have to win its final match to split the championship between the two teams.

Against Toledo, the Huskies started off strong, getting the doubles point. The newly ranked No. 83 doubles team of Dor Amir and Axel Lagerlof started the game with a win in the No. 1 over Toledo’s Stjepan Sisko and Garrett Cona. The duo is now 17-2 on the season and is nationally ranked for the second time this season.

In the No. 3, Matt Lynch and Jovan Zeljkovic sealed the doubles point for the Huskies, getting an 8-5 win over Roberto Meza and Boris Pak.

The two teams split the singles matches, each taking three wins.

In the No. 1, Amir handily knocked off Toledo’s Mark Singnil, 6-2, 6-4.

NIU’s second win came in the No. 3, where Frederic Cadieux continued his excellent play against Nicky Wong, getting a 6-1, 6-0 win.

The final singles point came in the No. 6, where Lynch took down Ben Brocker, 6-1, 6-2. Lynch has yet to drop a match in the No. 6 position this season.

Toledo got wins in the No. 2, No. 4 and No. 5 matches. On the season, NIU has won 80 percent of its matches in these three positions while Toledo has won only 26 percent.

“We struggled where we didn’t expect to,” said head coach Patrick Fisher. “Toledo’s weakness is in the 4, 5 and 6, while our strength is in those matches. Our strengths weren’t really our strengths. But I’m really proud of our team for still pulling through and getting the four points we needed.”

The Huskies finish their regular season Friday against Buffalo before starting the MAC Tournament the following week.