Men's Tennis Drops Final Conference Match to Dartmouth

On paper it seemed like Dartmouth (14-10, 5-2) had pulled off a major upset against the Harvard (19-7, 5-2) men’s tennis team. The No. 45 Big Green beat the No. 34 Crimson, 4-3, at the Boss Tennis Center at Dartmouth, leaving both schools tied for second place in the Ivy League behind champion Columbia.

However, the scores don’t tell the full story.

Dartmouth gained an early advantage after opening the afternoon with two straight doubles wins. Sophomore Brian Yeung and freshman Jean Thirouin gave Harvard their only doubles win of the day by defeating their Big Green opponents, 6-4.

“Dartmouth had a tremendous fraternity crowd out there…. There’s a large home court advantage,” Harvard coach Dave Fish ’72 said. “We lost the doubles point by the closest of margins, and we’ve been actually losing the doubles points by bigger margins, so I was very proud of their efforts.”

The Crimson rallied and fought back from behind, proceeding to garner three straight victories in the singles matches. Yeung proceeded to notch another win for the Crimson by beating his singles opponent Diego Pedraza, 6-4, 6-3, while co-captain Alex Steinroeder won his match in straight sets. Freshman Kenny Tao added to the winning streak by winning 7-5, 6-3, over Dartmouth’s George Wall.

“I was really proud of our guys, just disappointed in the outcome,” Fish said. “They played like heroes to get in and have a chance to win. Yes, [the loss] was disappointing, but boy, their efforts were tremendous to come so close. Hats off to Dartmouth, we did everything we could but sometimes the ball just bounces the other way.”

Despite junior Nicky Hu’s solid efforts, the Big Green recaptured the momentum when Hu was bested by Chris Kipouras. Hu managed to take the first set, 6-4, but fell in the next two, 6-2, 6-4. Hu was even ahead, 4-1, in the third set, but luck fell Dartmouth’s way and the Big Green triumphed in the end.

“Nicky played tremendously,” Fish said. “[But] it was just a Dartmouth game where every close shot that the guy could escape with, he did. It was excruciatingly close, one of the most exciting matches I’ve been in involved in.”

Finally, co-captain Denis Nguyen – ranked No. 1 at Harvard and No. 43 nationally– fell to another ranked opponent: No. 54 Dovydas Sakinis, 5-7, 6-4, 6-2, which resulted in a victory for the Big Green. Nguyen holds a 17-12 overall record in singles.

Nguyen and three other teammates—Steinroeder, Shaun Chaudhuri and Henry Steer—played their last regular season matches for the Crimson on Saturday. The four seniors have aided Harvard successfully in its quest for a trip to the NCAA tournament for the past three years and hope to solidify a fourth straight NCAA appearance. Nguyen became the Crimson’s first All-American since 2005 at last years NCAA Tournament with an appearance in the men’s singles semifinals.

“I think we have a really good team, a really talented team, and I definitely think we can get another year,” Steer said.

The Crimson’s NCAA bid is still at-large but the bid seems to be in their favor. Although this loss against the lower ranked Dartmouth will impact their rankings, an early season win against the now-ranked No. 3 Minnesota should be enough to offset this loss.

“It was a tough day but a kick in the pants really gets us fired up for NCAAs,” Steer said. “If we can pull it all together – and I’ve seen flashes of it through the season – we can definitely try and make a run.”