The Northern Kentucky University tennis teams competed in the Great Lakes Valley Conference Tournament in Springfield, Mo., held April 20-21.
Both teams ended the event with a fourth place finish.
In the first round, both teams defeated No. 3 West team, Missouri-Saint Louis. The men won the event 5-0, sweeping the three doubles matches. Juniors Guillaume Berman and Andre Correa picked up singles victories.
The women also defeated the Tritons, winning 5-2. Sophomore Marta Romeo, freshman Clemence Binon and junior Jenny Hand won their singles matches. Romeo and Hand also won their doubles matches, partnering with seniors Whitney Thomas and Jillian Sturgeon, respectively.
In the semifinals, both teams fell to the No. 1 West seed, Drury. The men lost 5-3 to the No. 20 nationally ranked team, winning two doubles matches and one single match.
Senior Tyler Fraser and sophomore Pierce Kohls won the No. 1 doubles match and Berman and freshman Drew Schroeder won the No. 3 doubles match.
Berman was the only man to claim a singles victory. Senior Martin Leroy and freshman Christopher Angulo lost in three sets in their singles matches after winning the first set.
“We were two sets away from defeating the No. 20 team in the country,” head coach Brian Nester said. “We showed we can play with the top schools.”
The women fell to No. 22 Drury, 5-1. The only victory for the Norse came in doubles with Hand and Sturgeon winning the No. 3 match.
“Drury has always been a top competitor,” Thomas said. “It was overall a good match, we just fell a little short.”
Both teams competed in the third place match on April 21. The teams both came up short, finishing in fourth place for the tournament. The men lost to No. 32 Southern Indiana, 5-2, and the women lost, 5-0, to Rockhurst. Fraser and Kohls won the top seeded doubles match and freshman Angulo won the No. 5 singles match for the men.
The men now have a 14-6 record, while the women’s record is 10-10.
Next on the schedule is the NCAA Tournament Preliminaries, held April 29-31. The women did not qualify, while the men advanced to the tournament.
The men, seeded No. 6, will play No. 3 Southern Indiana with the winner facing No. 2 Northwood (Mich.)
The Norse played the Screaming Eagles twice this season, losing both times. In addition to the GLVC Tournament, NKU also lost to Southern Indiana in the regular season on March 31, 6-3.
Nester looks forward to playing Southern Indiana again and said that a key to the matches were the doubles matches.
“We need to find a way to win two of the three doubles matches because if we don’t we have to win four singles matches,” Nester said. “It’s possible, but it makes it more difficult against one of the top teams in the country.”
The team not only would like to beat the Screaming Eagles for the first time this year, but would also like to beat last year’s NCAA Tournament results.
“Last year we lost in the first round, 5-4, to Northwood,” Kohls said. “We hope to get past that first round obstacle. We have plans to go far in the tourney, and we know we have the ability to.”