COLLEGEVILLE, Pa. – Despite gaining an early edge in doubles, the Ursinus Men's Tennis team suffered a 7-2 setback to Franklin & Marshall on Tuesday night in Centennial Conference action at the Floy Lewis Bakes Center.
With the loss, the Bears record fell to 8-7 overall and 2-5 in Centennial Conference action. Meanwhile, the Diplomats improved to 7-6 overall and 4-3 in conference play.
The match was moved indoors to the Floy Lewis Bakes Center off and on rains hampered the Perkiomen Valley High School tennis courts. Ursinus took a 2-1 lead following three highly competitive doubles matches. Sophomores Rob Ritchie and Darby Rogers put the Bears on the board after edging Tristan Steffe and Justin Pace 8-6 at number two doubles. At number one singles, sophomores Lars Jespersen and Will Oberholtzer won a dramatic 8-7 (7-5) match over Adrian Charchalis and Isaac Rockower before the Diplomats gained their first point on an 8-6 win at number three doubles as Anthony Casale and Pedro Norte downed junior Noah Mandel and sophomore Ethan Yu.
Franklin & Marshall won all six singles points to win the match after trailing in doubles. Pace took down Oberholtzer 6-2, 6-3 in number two singles before Steffe bested Ritchie 6-3, 6-4 at the number three position. Charchalis bested Jespersen 7-5, 6-4 at the number one spot and Rogers suffered a 6-4, 6-1 loss to Rockower at number four doubles. Casale edged Yu 6-4, 6-4 at the number six spot while Norte defeated Mandel 6-0, 7-5 at the number five spot.
The Bears will return to action on Thursday, April 28th as they will take on DeSales in their final non-conference match of the season at 3:30 p.m.