M. Tennis Wins in San Diego, Falls to Stanford

The No. 47 Harvard men’s tennis team’s tough spring break road trip began unpleasantly in northern California, but concluded with a pair of encouraging wins in San Diego.

In sunny San Diego on Friday, the Crimson (9-8) was easily victorious over the University of San Diego, 6-1.

Harvard first captured the doubles point 2-1 with victories by junior Chris Chiou and sophomore Jonathan Chu (8-5 at No. 2) and co-captain Oli Choo and junior Cliff Nguyen (8-2 at No. 3).

Singles points against the Toreros (11-5) came from junior co-captain No. 1 David Lingman (6-1, 6-4), junior No. 2 Mark Riddell (6-4, 6-4), Nguyen (6-1, 1-6, 6-4 at No. 4), sophomore Jason Beren (6-2, 7-5 at No. 5) and Chiou (6-4, 6-3 at No. 6).

“We had really good support and kept the intensity up through the end of the last match,” junior Jordan Bohnen said.

Bohnen was referring to the efforts of the Harvard Club of San Diego, which brought plenty of vocal supporters and a Harvard banner, making the match feel much more like a home game.

On Thursday, the Crimson won a hard-fought, 4-3 victory over the University of California, Santa Barbara Gauchos (8-6). Harvard came out strong and captured the doubles point 2-1, with victories again coming from Chiou and Chu, and Choo and Nguyen.

The Crimson clinched the win early, with singles wins from Lingman (6-2, 6-3), No. 61 Chu (6-1, 6-3 at No. 3) and Chiou (6-1, 6-4).

“We had lost some really close matches over the week, but today everything seemed to come together,” Choo said.

Against San Diego State University on Wednesday, the Crimson lost a tight match, 5-2. Chiou and Chu won their doubles match, and with the doubles score 1-1, Choo and Nguyen fought hard in the deciding doubles match, but ultimately lost 8-6 to the Aztecs (11-9) after several momentum shifts.

In singles, Harvard’s only points came from Riddell (7-5, 4-6, (10-3)) and Nguyen (6-3, 6-1 at No. 5).

Before arriving in San Diego, the Crimson played in northern California, competing at Stanford and finishing an earlier match with Fresno State.

The No. 6 Cardinal (14-2) provided a tough test for the Crimson, which ultimately fell 6-1 on Monday. The lone Harvard point came from doubles, where Chiou and Chu (8-5) and Choo and Nguyen (8-3) prevailed against two of the toughest doubles teams in the nation.

On March 22, the Crimson continued its match against Fresno State, 2,050 miles away from Montgomery, Ala., where the 3-3 match from the Blue-Gray Classic had been suspended a week earlier due to rain.

Harvard was ahead 3-0, winning the doubles point behind a sweep by the No. 58 pairing of Lingman and Riddell (8-5), Chiou and Chu (8-4) and Choo and Nguyen (8-3) and claiming singles victories by Lingman (6-3, 6-1) and Choo (6-2, 6-1 at No. 4).

But the Bulldogs (10-6) battled back to tie the match at 3-3 after three close, well-contested matches went in their favor, and Beren’s match against Sergiu Modoc at No. 6 had to be halted due to the rain with him leading 3-2 in the third set.

When the contest resumed, Beren won the first game to build a 4-2 lead, but dropped the next three. Beren then fought off three match points over the next three games to force a tiebreak. There, Beren took two of the first three points, but Modoc ran off six of the final seven to take the match, 6-4, 5-7, 7-6 (3) and clinch the Fresno State victory.

The Crimson returns to action on Saturday at 11:30 a.m. as it hosts William and Mary in its final tuneup before its Ivy League campaign begins Sunday at Dartmouth.