Men's Tennis: Still working out kinks, Tigers go 1-2 at ECAC

The Tigers, who were the No. 3 seed in the tournament, were matched up against No. 59 Dartmouth, who, despite being ranked ahead of the Tigers in the ITA rankings, was only given the No. 6 seed for the tournament.

The Tigers got on the board first, taking the doubles point thanks to victories from the pairing of sophomore Zack McCourt and senior Matija Pecotic and the pairing of junior Augie Bloom and senior Matt Siow. The Big Green evened the score at one, however, when Chris Kipouras beat Bloom in straight sets. Bloom’s classmate, Dan Richardson, took back the lead for the Tigers when his volley was just out of the reach of Brandon DeBot. Pecotic, ranked third in the nation in singles, further extended Princeton’s lead with a straight sets victory of his own. McCourt then clinched the match for the Tigers with a strong crosscourt backhand.

The win advanced the Tigers to the semifinals, where they were to face a Columbia team that had beaten George Washington 4-2. The Tigers were looking for revenge in the match, as the Lions had handed them one of their worst defeats last season, a 6-1 stomping that had destroyed the last bit of hope that Princeton had for an Ivy League title.

As they did against Dartmouth, the Tigers jumped out to an early 1-0 lead via victories in two of the three doubles matches. The Lions dominated singles play early, however, winning the first three matches to establish a commanding 3-1 lead, putting Princeton in the tough situation of having to win all three of the remaining singles matches to pull out a victory. Straight set victories by senior Matt Spindler and Richardson at the four and five spots tied the game, putting the match on the shoulders of Pecotic, who was engaged in a very close contest against No. 60 Winston Lin, the only other ranked player in the tournament. Pecotic fell just short of ensuring the victory for the Tigers however, falling 6-4 in the third set.

“I thought we lost focus on some of the big points, which is what really determines the winner and loser in these kinds of matches,” Pecotic said. “If we had done that better, we might have been in the finals on Sunday instead of playing for third and fourth place.”

On the final day of the tournament, the Tigers played top-seeded Harvard, who had been upset by Cornell 4-2 the day before, in the third-place game. The Crimson, ranked 47th in the nation, is the defending Ivy League champion and had beaten the Tigers in their encounter the year before.

The game was a close one from beginning to end, as the match between the two rivals included more three-setters than the Tigers had played in the first two games of the tournament. After the first five singles matches, the Tigers were facing a 3-2 deficit, with Siow in the third set of his match as he tried to extend the game to doubles play, which he did by taking the set 6-3. The Tigers ran out of gas in doubles, where they lost both matches to lose their second straight game 4-3.

“There is nothing else to do but prepare for the next day of practice and look forward to this weekend’s matches to gain some momentum again and build it up again,” Pecotic said, with regard to what the team must do to overcome back-to-back close losses.

The tournament dropped the Tigers to 3-3 on the season, but also helped the Tigers identify spots where they could improve before Ivy League play begins on March 30.

“I think doubles could improve, and I think we actually have to serve more percent of first serves,” Pecotic said. “I thought that for playing on such quick courts, we should not have lost our services games so many times.”