Megan PellegrinoFollowing a 6-3 loss to Marywood University April 2, the men’s tennis team bounced back to defeat Alvernia College 5-4.
With the match at Alvernia knotted up at 4 wins apiece, it came down to Drew Brandstetter at the No. 5 singles spot, who was already down 1 game to 2.
“I was already down 1-2 and when I looked over, my teammate was down 0-5,” the junior finance major said.
Luckily for the team, Brandstetter didn’t choke, but rather took the situation and turned it into a win.
“I just tried to be patient and wait for the right chances to take the right shots,” Brandstetter said. “The win felt good.”
The win felt even better for the team after falling to the undefeated Marywood University, who advanced to 6-0.
The Cavaliers found themselves in a hole relatively early, losing all three doubles matches.
“We made a few changes to our doubles lineup against Marywood,” Brandstetter said.
Unfortunately the changes didn’t turn out in the Cavs favor, as they began singles play already down three matches.
“If we won one of those doubles matches, it’s a whole different match.”
Duff O’Connor, Brandstetter and Justin Walsh defeated their singles opponents, but it just wasn’t enough to pull out the win.
“We played them tough,” said O’Connor, a junior business major. “We are definitely looking forward to another chance to play them again in the playoffs. We’ll get another chance at them.”
The team knew exactly what it had to do in order to get a W at Alvernia and they did just that: win the majority of their doubles matches.
“Going into a match down 3-0, puts a lot of pressure on all of us,” Brandstetter said. “One more loss and that’s it. With 6 matches, that’s a lot to think about.”
Going into singles play up 2-1 however, the Cavaliers didn’t have that problem.
The doubles team of O’Connor and Justin Walsh defeated their opponents and Michael Sim and John VanWagner also recorded a victory.
In singles however, Alvernia evened up the score, creating the 4-4 tie during Brandstetter’s match.
“We played well and had a key victory at the number 5 spot,” O’Connor said. “Drew [Brandstetter] is a great player.”
“I was pretty excited,” Brandstetter said. “I didn’t want to let everyone down. We lost a tough match to them last year so, it was real nice to get the win against them this time.”
As the week came to an end, the team found themselves with a 4-5 record and 3-2 in the Pennsylvania Athletic Conference.
