ORANGE, Calif. – The Haverford College men's tennis team dropped a hard-fought 5-4 battle against Chapman on Wednesday afternoon. The Fords swept the No. 4 through No. 6 singles matches, but just could not quite overcome the Pathers' 2-1 lead from doubles.
Chapman got out to that early lead with wins at No. 1 and No. 3 doubles, coming away with team points by respective 8-5 and 8-4 scores. The Fords' middle doubles pairing of George Jiang and Pranav Krishnan rallied to keep the first part of the match from becoming a sweep with a win in tiebreaks. After splitting the first 14 games, Haverford's No. 2 pairing won seven of the 10 points during the tiebreak as the Fords trailed just 2-1 heading into singles play. The Jiang/Krishnan pairing is now 2-1 this spring and 7-2 overall dating back to the fall.
Arnav Patodia evened the team score at two-all with a resounding victory at No. 6 singles. He allowed just two games – one during each set – during a straight set victory. Patodia's victory was the first of his young spring season. Despite Haverford sweeping the bottom half of the singles lineup, the Panthers answered that challenge by sweeping Nos. 1 through 3 singles. Kevin Yan won six games for the Fords at No. 2, while George Jiang and Josh Moskovitz won five and four games, respectively.
Even with the final team result decided, Haverford concluded the match with some momentum as Pranav Krishnan and Nick Sweeney won 10-point tiebreaks in the final two matches on court. Krishnan won his opening set by a 6-4 score and secured a convincing 10-3 advantage in the ultimate tiebreak for his first win of the spring in singles. Co-captain Sweeney also won his opening set, posting a 6-2 result. Sweeney was equally up to the challenge in his tiebreak as he won by a 10-4 score. Sweeney's victory was also his first of the spring in singles and gives him four total singles victories dating back to the fall.
Men's tennis will continue its stretch in California on Thursday with the only date of back-to-back matches in the same day. Tomorrow's action begins against No. 32 Rochester (N.Y.). That match will be followed by a contest against Wheaton (Mass.).