Princeton University
Columbia
Players Mentioned
Men's Tennis Defeats Columbia, 5-2; Ivy Title Match Set for Sunday
April 15, 2011 | Men's Tennis
PRINCETON -- The Princeton men's tennis team has done all it can to this point, and one more match stands in between Princeton and the 2011 Ivy League title.
The Tigers defeated Columbia 5-2 Friday afternoon at the Lenz Tennis Center while in Philadelphia, Cornell beat Penn 5-2. Both Princeton and Cornell stand undefeated in Ivy League play, Princeton at 6-0 and Cornell at 5-0 with an additional match for the Big Red next weekend at Columbia.
If Princeton wins Sunday's 1 p.m. match in Ithaca, the Tigers will be the outright Ivy League champions and gain an automatic berth to the NCAA tournament. If Cornell wins, the Big Red will win at least a share of the title and would have to win at Columbia to win the outright title. A Cornell win Sunday and loss to Columbia next weekend would give a share of the crown to Princeton, but the automatic NCAA berth would still go to Cornell with the head-to-head win over the Tigers.
Princeton had to rally against the Lions after losing the doubles point, and Columbia took a 2-0 lead after Tizian Bucher defeated Dan Richardson on court five in the first singles match to be decided. The last five singles matches, however, went to the Tigers, and so did the team victory.
After Matt Siow, Matija Pecotic and Matt Spindler won their singles matches to put Princeton ahead 3-2, Augie Bloom and Alex Faust were left to play for the clinching win. Both players had lost the second set of their matches, and Bloom had to fight back from being down 6-4 in the third-set tiebreak to win it 9-7. The match then clinched, Faust also rebounded from the second-set loss to make it a 5-2 final with a 6-3 win in the third set.
Princeton's 6-0 start continued its best run to begin the league season since 1992, when the Tigers were a part of the 10-team Eastern Intercollegiate Tennis Association.
(58) Princeton (13-6, 6-0) 5, Columbia (7-14, 1-4) 2
Doubles
1. Gery/Yetimoglu (C) def. Pecotic/Siow (P), 8-6
2. Michael Lin/Yohei Shoji (P) def. C. Bucher/T. Bucher (C), 8-6
3. Bloom/Faust (P) def. Sho Matsumoto/Schneiderman (C), 9-8
Order of finish: 2,1,3
Singles
1. Matija Pecotic (P) def. Haig Schneiderman (C), 6-4, 6-2
2. Matt Spindler (P) def. Nathaniel Gery (C), 6-1, 2-6, 6-2
3. Augie Bloom (P) def. John Yetimoglu (C), 6-3, 6-7(3), 7-6(7)
4. Matt Siow (P) def. Cyril Bucher (C), 6-0, 6-3
5. Tizian Bucher (C) def. Dan Richardson (P), 6-4, 6-3
6. Alex Faust (P) def. Rajeev Deb-Sen (C), 6-4, 4-6, 6-3
Order of finish: 5,4,1,2,3,6