Playing a little over a day after a resounding loss, the Hillsdale College men's tennis team showed its grit and came back with a vengeance on Sunday afternoon.
The Chargers earned a 6-1 victory over visiting Purdue Northwest to even their record in 2022 at 2-2 overall and pick up a key regional victory that helps get them back on track.
The match swung with a big result in doubles for Hillsdale. The Chargers' No. 2 doubles pairing of sophomore Daniel Gilbert and freshman Jonathan Degtyaryov took a 6-3 victory, while Purdue Northwest's No. 3 doubles team won 6-4. That meant the doubles point came down to the result at No. 1 doubles, and, in an extremely tight, well-played match, Hillsdale's top pairing of sophomore Sean Barstow and junior Tyler Conrad won a 10-8 tiebreak to take a 7-6 victory over the Pride's Miguel Cepeda and Levent Evyapan and strike an early blow for the Chargers.
Hillsdale carried that momentum into singles play, winning five of six matches to claim the victory. Barstow got his second victory of the day at No. 1 singles for the Chargers, beating Cepeda 7-5, 6-3, and Conrad also won at No. 2 singles for Hillsdale, beating Luca Kirchhoff 6-4, 6-0.
Gilbert won a hard-fought match at No. 3 singles to go undefeated on the day as well for Hillsdale, beating Evyapan 6-4, 7-6 (5), and Degtyaryov also finished undefeated with a dominant 6-1, 6-1 win over PNW's Luis Alvear at No. 4 singles.
Junior Bogdan Janiciejevic put the icing on the victory cake for Hillsdale with his first singles win of the season after multiple near-misses, beating the Pride's Jonas Franssen 6-3, 6-0 to give the Chargers a win at No. 5 singles as well.
Next week presents more challenging matches for the Chargers, who travel to Grand Rapids on Saturday to take on host Davenport at 9 a.m., then face one of the top teams in the region on Sunday with a match against Ferris St. in Big Rapids at 2:30 p.m.
Photo by Isabella Sheehan