Looking ahead to the weekend

A bit of an interesting weekend for the Fighting Squirrels as we only have one match this weekend. Saturday 2:30pm we host conference opponent George Fox University. The match will be played at the outdoor OR indoor courts depending on the weather. The weatherman says sunny and 50 on Saturday. Our fingers are crossed for an outdoor match, but this time of the year the weatherman is often wrong more than right.

Saturday the team will be providing pizza for spectators at the start of the match. Against UC Santa Cruz we had such a great turnout we thought we would again provide pizza. We had over 200 people show up for the UCSC match..so show up early for pizza and the start of doubles.

Still early in the season so it is hard to get a read on conference. George Fox has a new coach and I expect their program to improve dramatically in the coming years. I must say I'm very glad to have coach Ninteman at George Fox working to make both George Fox and the NWC stronger. I'm sure the George Fox team will be more competitive this year but I think they are a couple years out from making a run at the top six in the conference. I have no doubt that the Bruins team will improve in the coming years.

Most interesting match-up should be at #1 where George Fox's Scott Barnett takes on Whitman's Matt Solomon. Barnett is off to a great start this year going 3-0 (winning against College of Idaho, Lewis Clark College, and Willamette) without dropping a set. As a team we are fired to be playing at home and hopefully create some momentum leading into a series of important March matches.

Hope to see you at the courts on Saturday.

Play in day at the ITAs

Today was the play-in day for the ITA Small College National Championships. The ITA Small College Championships is an 8 person/team draw. However because of geographic issues the winners of the Northwest and Southwest regions play-off a day early to determine the 8th tournament spot. These play off matches are pressure packed -- win and you are guaranteed 3 matches, lose and you out of the tournament.

Day started off well for Whitman as Matt Solomon played solid tennis defeating the #1 player from Trinity 6-4, 7-6. Matt showed great composure rallying from 1-5 down in the 2nd (including a match point) to win the match. Hats off to Matt for keeping his composure and battling back against tough odds to beat a talented opponent.

In the afternoon match Matt and Etienne Moshevich faced off against a fiesty #1 doubles team from Trinity. In the first set the Fighting Squirrels started off strong going up a quick break. However the Trinity team fought their way back into the match and served for the 1st set at 6-5. At this point Matt and ET played a brilliant return game sending the 1st set into a breaker. In the breaker it was all Whitman as Matt and ET cruised to a 7-3 victory. However the Trinity team stepped up their play winning the second set 6-4. At the ITA's doubles is determined by a match breaker in the third set. Matt and ET started off strong and took an early 5-2 lead. However the Trinity duo when on a streak bombing in 1st serves and crushing every return they laid a racket on. Their strong play lead to a 10-7 tie break victory.

Tomorrow at 8:30am Matt playes against the #1 from Gustavus Aldophus. I will try to send twitter updates to the blog after each set.