KNOXVILLE, Tenn. – For the second straight day, Carson-Newman men's tennis comes out on top as they defeat the Lees-McRae Bobcats (0-4, 0-0 CC) Saturday afternoon in Knoxville. As the Eagles and Bobcats took the courts of the Knoxville Racquet Club, it would be the home state team taking a clean 7-0 sweep over the visitors from Banner Elk.
The Eagles and Lees-McRae squared off came in March 2011 as it was a flip of the script that specific day. The Carson-Newman men's tennis team suffered a 9-0 loss to Lees-McRae as they lost all three doubles matches before being swept in all singles competition as well in 2011.
Therefore, with a clean sweep victory, C-N claimed their first win over LMC since at least 2011. The Eagles (3-1, 0-0 SAC) did not waste a second as they came out firing and took the early 1-0 advantage behind three impressive wins in doubles.
The first doubles win for C-N came thanks to the efforts of Rintaro Oka (Narita, Japan) and Marnix Van Dalen (Netherlands) who started the action off with a 6-2 victory. The Eagles kept it rolling as Ids Waterbolk (Bennekom, Netherlands) and Gjorgji Jankulovski (Macedonia) kept up their sensational start to 2022 with a 6-3 victory at number two doubles to give the doubles point to C-N. The win pushes Waterbolk/Jankulovski to a perfect 4-0 in 2022.
Finally, junior Marc Janse (Zeewolde, Netherlands) and sophomore Lars Hordijk (Dordrecht, South Holland) wrapped up the clean sweep in doubles as they saw the closest result Saturday as they would escape Knoxville with a cheeky 7-6 win.
"There were a couple matches today where we did not play our best tennis, but still came out with the win which is what counts in the end of the day," graduate coach Gabriel Dabdab said.
Once singles started, the momentum was all in favor of C-N as the Eagles did not let up for one single match. Marc Janse, playing in number two singles, pushed the Eagles advantage to 2-0 on Saturday after he claimed a 6-0, 6-3 victory. After Saturday, Janse joins two other teammates with a 3-1 singles record in the early stages of 2022.
However, not to be outdone, Ids Waterbolk remained a perfect 8-0 overall (4-0 in doubles and 4-0 in singles) as he continued playing number six singles for C-N. The Netherlands native is one of two C-N men's tennis athletes to be unblemished in singles, as he won 6-0, 6-4 on Saturday. The Eagles made it 4-0 in their favor after Gjorgji Jankulovski won his number four singles match 6-4, 6-3.
As part of the clean sweep, one major bright spot for C-N came from number one singles. Freshman Marnix Van Dalen finally claimed his first ever singles win of 2022 after battling through a three-set battle and holding the 6-4, 1-6, 10-6 result and win. This is Van Dalen's first win in four matches this season.
Then, the Eagles pulled away for sure as they received two more singles victories to finish off the 7-0 sweep. First, Rintaro Oka swept his number three singles match with a 6-1, 7-5 victory to make it 6-0 C-N and move his 2022 win streak to three straight. Finally, Lars Hordijk played number five singles once more as he would gather the final point on Saturday with a 6-3, 6-3 win.
The Eagles return to action next Tuesday as they hit the road for their first true road trip of 2022. C-N will head to Sewanee, Tenn. for a matchup with the Tigers on Feb. 17 at 4:00 p.m.
"We have to be able to play the same way no matter the level of competition," Dabdab said. "At the same time, when the matches have been close, we have stepped up and truly proven to be the better team to get the win."
Be sure to keep up with all things Carson-Newman tennis at cneagles.com and on all social media.
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