Costa Mesa, CA – The Principia Men's Tennis Team played their final match of Spring Break against the Concordia University Irvine Eagles. They are a Division 2 program that has some extremely strong players. The Panthers were pushed to raise their level of play against their hard hitting opponents. Concordia Irvine took the match 9-0, and while the Panthers were outclassed, they fought hard throughout the match.
At 1
st doubles,
Jules Kitchingman and
Nat Kenworthy played hard and made their opponent beat them. Their opponents were tactical and extremely skilled. Many of the games went to deuce, but Kitchingman and Kenworthy were unable to come away with any of the points that would have allowed them to stay within striking distance. They fell 8-1. Both 2
nd singles and 3
rd singles struggled to stay with their opponents. Too many unforced errors by the Panthers allowed the Concordia Irvine teams to run away with easy 8-0 victories.
In the Panthers singles matches, Principia was able to stay strong in rallies, but were unable to string enough points together to win many games. Both
Peter Griswold and
Dan Wagstaff fought hard at 5
th and 6
th singles, but fell 6-0, 6-0.
Greg Sovie,
Brody Swan, and
Nat Kenworthy all played against excellent opponents at 2
nd, 3
rd and 4
th singles. Despite all losing 6-1, 6-0, they never stopped competing and played hard until the final point of the match.
Playing at 1
st singles,
Jules Kitchingman again had the match of the day. He played exceptionally well in the first set against his opponent, coming away with the set 6-3. After the first set, Kitchingman's opponent picked up his play and started crushing the ball, on his way to winning the set 6-0. The match came down to a third set tiebreaker in which Kitchingman fought valiantly. In the end, he fell 3-6, 6-0, 10-4, but showed the consistency, power, and speed that could make him a dominant force as he continues to grow as a player.
Principia will begin their SLIAC conference season on Tuesday, March 28
th at 6:00 PM at Shaw Park in St. Louis. The Panthers will look apply what they learned from their spring break matches as they start off on their quest to win their 4
th straight SLIAC Championship.
