GRANVILLE, Ohio – The 27th ranked Denison men's tennis team suffered a 5-4 defeat to No. 30 Kalamazoo College on Saturday evening at the Mitchell Fieldhouse in Granville.
Competing against their second nationally-ranked opponent of the dual season, the Big Red opened doubles play with an early win on the No. 2 court as Vlad Rotnov and Akshat Agarwal defeated Zack Ray and Jai Banerji, 8-2. Despite the early lead, the Hornet rebounded with wins in the top flight from Ian Yi and Daniel Henry, as well as on the No. 3 court from Tytus Metzler and Peter Fitzgerald. Denison entered singles play with a 2-1 deficit.
Entering singles competition, Metzler extended the Kalamazoo lead to 3-1 with a pair of 6-0 victories over Jack Bulger in No. 3 play. DU's Tim Cianciola rallied for a 7-6 win over Yi in the top flight following an injury and KC's Gabe Vidinas answered with a 6-0 defeat of Hayden McNamara.
Trailing 4-2 with three matches to go, Rotnov outlasted Henry for a three-set victory (7-6, 3-6, 6-3) on the No. 2 court while Jacob Dennen rallied from an early deficit to defeat Casey Johnson 2-6, 6-2, 6-4 to tie the match at 4-4. While back-to-back wins brought the Big Red back into the match, their comeback fell short when Banerji defeated Agarwal 6-1, 7-5 in No. 5 singles. The loss dropped Denison to 4-3 on the season while Kalamazoo improved to 4-2.
Denison will return to action on Monday, March 16 when they open their spring break trip with a 12:00 p.m. PST matchup with No. 37 Babson College in Claremont, California.
