Feb. 21, 2010

Box Score

ST. PETER, MN - The Johns Hopkins men's tennis team defeated ninth-ranked Carnegie Mellon, 6-3, to finish fifth at the 2010 ITA Division III National Indoor Championships. The Blue Jays win their second straight match and improve to 2-1, while the Tartans slip to 6-3.

Hopkins took a 2-1 lead after doubles with wins at first and third. Alex Nemerov and Bobby MacTaggart picked up the first point of the match, beating 15th-ranked Jacob Barnab (Phoenix, AZ/Desert Vista) and Casey Blythe (Louisville, KY/St. Xavier), 8-2. Senior David Maldow (Jericho, NY/Jericho) and junior Andrew Wang (Sparta, NJ/Sparta) evened the match at 1-1 with an 8-5 win over sixth-ranked James Muliawan and Nikola Ljuboja. Freshman Adam Mernit (Bayside, NY/Walt Whitman) and junior Ryan Rauck (Columbus, OH/Bexley) won a close 9-7 match over Duke Miller and Jeremy King to give Hopkins a 2-1 lead.

Jon Spero evened the match at 2-2 with a straight sets win (6-1, 6-4) over junior Will Grist (Charlotte, NC/Heritage Academy (SC)) at fifth singles. Wang gave Hopkins back a one-point lead with a 6-3, 7-5 win over MacTaggart at second. The win was Wang's 47 career singles win, moving him into a tie for third in school history. At first, 13th-ranked Maldow rebounded for a three-set win over Nemerov, 0-6, 6-3, 6-2. Barnaby followed with a straight sets win (6-3, 6-3) at sixth over Harsha Rao. Muliawan made it a 5-3 match with a three-set win over sophomore Warren Elgort (New York, NY/Trinity) at third. Freshman Andy Hersh (Valrico, FL/Newsome) wrapped up the match with a 7-5, 6-0 win over Miller at fourth.

Hopkins will now be idle for three weeks and will return to action on Monday, March 15 at Division II Flagler in St. Augustine, FL.