Bowling Green State University Athletics
Bowling Green State University
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Men's Tennis Has Successful Start To Season
September 23, 2001 | Men's Tennis
Sept. 23, 2001
BOWLING GREEN, Ohio - The Bowling Green State University men's tennis team got the 2001-02 season off to a successful start, posting four flight titles at the BGSU/Keefe Invitational. The eight-team tournament was held Friday-Sunday (Sept. 21-23) at Keefe Courts.
No team scores were kept at the event, which actually kicked off Saturday due to a thunderstorm that hit as the players were preparing to start Friday's action.
Juniors Nicolas Lopez-Acevedo and Peter Gardonyi and freshman Ian Bliss won singles titles for the Brown and Orange, while Gardonyi teamed with senior Ed Kuresman for a doubles crown.
Gardonyi won all eight of his matches on the weekend.
DePaul University's Dan Bennett won the remaining singles title, while teammates Robert Kurek and Andy Michael teamed for a doubles crown.
"This was a very solid start to what should be a great season," said BGSU head coach Jay Harris. "We had the best record of any team this weekend. To finish ahead of DePaul, who is ranked ahead of us, shows how well we battled all weekend."
Each of the four singles flights consisted of 16 competitors, and each of the two doubles brackets was maed up of 16 teams.
In the orange flight, Lopez-Acevedo beat his BGSU teammate, senior Vitek Wild, in the final. Wild had gotten to the final match with a come-from-behind win over DePaul's Jevgenji Cariov in the semifinal round.
Junior Geoff Hiscox also competed in the orange flight, and had a 3-1 record. He lost to Cariov in the second round before rallying to win his next two matches.
"Vitek's win in the semifinals was huge," said Harris. "Cariov is ranked 25th in the nation. Nicolas had four very good wins this weekend as well."
Senior Mike Kossoff and sophomore Joel Carney each went 2-1 in the brown flight. Both players won a pair of matches before losing in the semifinal round. The two will meet in the third-place match, as part of the Falcons' Tuesday (Sept. 25) practice.
DePaul's Bennett beat Wright State's Chad Camper in the championship match of the brown flight.
The Falcons' lone freshman, Ian Bliss, sailed through the white flight bracket, losing a total of just nine games in eight sets, all wins. Bliss downed senior Ed Kuresman in the championship match.
Gardonyi, BGSU's lone competitor in the grey flight, posted a perfect 4-0 record, with a 6-2, 6-3 win over WSU's Kevin Teufel in the championship.
In all, Falcon singles competitors posted a combined record of 25-5, with two of the five losses coming to BG teammates.
In doubles play, the Wild/Kossoff team finished second in the orange flight, winning three matches before suffering an 8-6 loss to the Kurek/Michael tandem in the championship round. Lopez-Acevedo and Hiscox finished fourth in that flight.
Gardonyi paired with Kuresman for the title in the brown flight, winning the championship by a 9-8 score over Falcon newcomers Bliss and Carney, posting an 11-9 decision in the tiebreaker.
BG's doubles duos went a collective 12-4 on the weekend.
The Falcons will return to action in two weeks, heading to Atlanta, Ga., for the ITA All-American (Oct. 5-8).
BGSU Singles Records Orange Flight Nicolas Lopez-Acevedo (1st)..... 4-0 Vitek Wild (2nd) ............... 3-1 Geoff Hiscox (5th) ............. 3-1Brown Flight Joel Carney (3rd/4th) .......... 2-1 Mike Kossoff (3rd/4th) ......... 2-1
White Flight Ian Bliss (1st) ................ 4-0 Ed Kuresman (2nd) .............. 3-1
Grey Flight Peter Gardonyi (1st) ........... 4-0
BGSU Doubles Records Orange Flight Kossoff/Wild (2nd) ............. 3-1 Lopez-Acevedo/Hiscox (4th) ..... 2-2
Brown Flight Gardonyi/Kuresman (1st) ........ 4-0 Bliss/Carney (2nd) ............. 3-1
