Raymond van Wasbeek further validated his selection to the 2000-01 All-Mid-American Conference First-Team this weekend as the NIU men’s tennis team competed in the ITA Midwest Region IV Championships.

Van Wasbeek advanced the furthest of any Huskie as he won his first two matches in the singles flight. His run ended after a 6-2, 6-1 to Matt Lockin of the University of Michigan.

“Raymond won the matches he should win and that’s good,” said coach Steven Rodecap. “It was a bit disappointing that he couldn’t go any farther, however. The draw really opened up if he could have made it past that round.”

Like the previous year, van Wasbeek and Aaron Forsberg hooked up in doubles and were victorious in a first-round match, this time against a duo from the University of Illinois-Chicago.

They weren’t as successful in the second round, as they fell to the second-seeded pair of Mike Costa and Nathan Zeder from the University of Illinois.

“We played pretty well in the first round and took care of them pretty easily,” said Forsberg. “In the second round we ran into some tougher competition.”

Also victorious for the Huskies was Erick Martinez, who emerged on top after a three-set match against fellow MAC competitor Pete Baghadati. But that was as far as Martinez advanced when he ran into fourth-seed Phil Stoldt of Illinois in the second round and lost 6-1, 6-1.

Juan Pablo Barriga had a short tournament; he suffered a hard-fought 6-7, 4-6 loss to Josh Axler of Northwestern.

“It’s nice to get some matches in against upper echelon competition, but we just need to get better to win those battles,” said Rodecap. “It did give us a chance to find out what we need to work on in preparing for the spring season in January.”

Spring season is more than two months away, and the Huskies won’t take the court again until Jan. 19 when they begin a trio of games against the Big Ten as they visit Northwestern.

“Hopefully we can get some good match play under our belts and build up some confidence for the MAC tournament,” said Forsberg.