PASADENA, Calif. - The 2015 Cal Lutheran men's tennis regular season came to a close today on the second and final day of the Southern California Intercollegiate Athletic Conference (SCIAC) Championships hosted by Caltech at numerous locations.
The Kingsmen opened the weekend with a 5-3 win over Chapman on Friday morning. In the afternoon, they faced the eventual tournament champion and top-seeded Claremont-Mudd-Scripps. The third place match pitted CLU against Redlands and a 7-2 loss dropped the Violet and Gold to fourth in the overall standings.
On Friday morning, CLU opened a 2-1 lead after doubles against the Panthers. Andrew Slater and Gio Valdez put up the first Cal Lutheran point of the day with an 8-5 win over Justin P. Thompson and Sam Mittledorf. Moises Cardenas and Jesse Knight then broke a 1-1 team tie with an 8-5 win at No. 1 over Chris Damion and Justin Thompson.
Once singles action got going, Cardenas disposed of Damion for the second time of the match, winning 6-0, 6-2. After CU locked up its final two points of the meeting, Cal Lutheran players won third set tiebreakers at both No. 5 and 2 by way of Knight and Fergus Scott, respectively. Knight came up with a 3-6, 6-3, 7-6 (7-4) victory prior to Scott posting a 6-3, 0-6, 6-4 win to clinch it for the Kingsmen. Slater was leading Mittledorf 1-6, 7-6, 4-1 when Scott put the match in the books so the meeting at No. 6 was halted.
In the afternoon, CMS swept past CLU with the closest contest coming at No. 1 singles where Cardenas took the first set before ultimately falling 2-6, 6-3, 6-2.
Playing for third place on Saturday morning, Cal Lutheran only managed to notch two points, both in singles action. The two players who did not win individual on Friday bounced back. Oliver Thornton defeated Taylor Hunt 6-3, 6-1 at No. 4 and on the third court Valdez recovered from an early deficit to win 1-6, 7-5, 1-0 (10-8) as the final match of the SCIAC season for the Violet and Gold.
Claremont-Mudd-Scripps claimed the team title for the 10th straight season as the Stags have gone undefeated in league play for 95 consecutive matches. The last team to defeat CMS was Cal Lutheran on April 15, 2005.
Cal Lutheran (10-13, 5-5 SCIAC) will wait to hear its team and team member's individual fates for NCAA Division III Tournament selections on Monday, May 4. Regional play will get underway on Friday, May 8 at Claremont-Mudd-Scripps.
Results: UR 6, CLU 3
Results: CMS 9, CLU 0
Results: CLU 5, CU 3
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