NASHVILLE, Tenn. — After a rocky few weeks, the No. 27 Vanderbilt men’s tennis team rallied together to defeat No. 25 Duke 5-2, and the Tennessee State Tigers 7-0.
“You know we worked all week on attitude,” said head coach Ian Duvenhage. “We said that if you have a bunch of guys out there that stay positive, and that handle adversity well then great things well. We played badly in doubles. I thought we were nervous and not very aware with the exception of no. 1 doubles. But in singles we went out and did what we’ve been talking about all year long; getting a quick start, asserting ourselves, and I’m really really proud of what we did out there today.”
“The Duke team is obviously a team that is struggling with some stuff, just like we were the last few matches. And they’re also a team that started the season in the top-10, and my hunch is that they’ll get it together.”
The Commodores faltered against the Blue Devils, but picked their first doubles point in four matches against the Tigers with all three teams earning a victory.
On court one, Cameron Klinger and Rhys Johnson put on a commanding performance taking down Duke’s Vincent Lin/Adrian Chamdani, 6-3.
Vanderbilt earned two ranked victories against Duke Saturday afternoon, with No. 97 Daniel Valent defeating No. 17 Nicolas Alvarez 6-3, 6-4 to clinch the Commodore victory. Senior Rhys Johnson took down No. 91 Catalin Mateas 7-5, 6-4 for his first ranked win of the season.
“I just kept believing in myself and I never doubted my strategy,” said Valent. I think I was also portraying that in my body language and I think that he beat himself, because he just didn’t see a way at different times to beat me.”
Freshman Alex Ross earned his first dual match victory for the black and gold, with a huge 6-2, 6-1 victory over Levine on court five.
One hour later, the Commodores took on the Tennessee State Tigers. Vanderbilt altered their lineup, allowing almost every player on the squad a chance to compete.
Baker Newman and Pen Binet both came out on fire going 6-0 in the first set, helping Vanderbilt sweep first sets overall in both matches.
In addition, Tate Allwardt, Binet and Vikram Chari all earned their first singles victories of the season, having last competed during the fall in the Commodore Scramble.
Allwardt, a sophomore from Boca Raton, Fla. came through with an easy 6-3 first set victory, only to battle through the second set to take it by a 7-6(3) tiebreaker. Binet earned Vanderbilt’s first win against TSU on court five; 6-0, 6-0. At six, Chari, a freshman out of Saratoga, Calif. completed an 8-game pro set (8-5) for his first victory on the team to seal the 7-0 sweep.
“We had two freshmen, three sophomores and one senior out of the court and they did not look like a young team. They looked like a veteran team, which makes me happy because the execution is sometimes hard to control. You’re going to have bad days, but there’s no excuse ever for a bad attitude.”
Vanderbilt looks to improve off Saturday’s victories in two weeks, as the squad travels to Evanston, Ill. to take on the Northwestern Wildcats.
