The men’s tennis team traveled to Provo, Utah to participate in the ITA Mountain Regional last week and compete with more than a dozen other schools. The team found some success during the tournament, with plenty of wins in the singles bracket and multiple doubles teams recording victories.
Three different Vandals made it out of the first round of the singles bracket to advance to the round of 64.
Sophomore Guilherme Scarpelli cruised past Boise State’s Harvey Shackleton in the first round and defeated Stefan Cooper of Weber State before losing to New Mexico State’s Christofer Goncalves.
Senior Mark Kovacs advanced all the way to the round of 16 before losing to New Mexico’s Dominic West after a hard-fought, three-set match by a score of 6-7(2), 6-1, 6-1. He recorded straight set wins against Tim Heslin of Boise State, Ryan Hardin of Northern Colorado, and Ignatius Castelineo of Denver University to put together a 3-1 record for the tournament.
Junior Carlos Longhi Neto also won three straight matches to make it to the round of 16, but he too did not make it to the quarterfinals. Longhi Neto battled to wins against Nevada’s Augustin Delahodde, Sergi Espias of New Mexico State, and Eric Samuelsson from UNLV before eventually falling to Montana’s Victor Casadevall in three sets by a score of 2-6, 6-3, 6-3.
Longhi Neto and Kovacs were also successful in the doubles bracket. The pair combined to make it all the way to the quarterfinals, defeating Nick Werner and Michiel Van Schoor from Weber State, Max Korkh and Ludvig Hallgren of Montana, and Utah State’s Jaime Barajas and Andrew Nakajima along the way. The pair played valiantly against Utah’s Joe Wolley and Dan Little, but failed to advance any farther after losing 8-5.
Overall, five different members of the team recorded wins in the singles brackets, and three doubles teams also had victories. Sophomore Esteban Santibanez defeated Northern Arizona’s Harun Ajanovic in the singles consolation bracket and was also successful in the doubles bracket. He and junior Lucas Coutinho went 1-1 in the doubles bracket, while Scarpelli and junior Peter Shin also won a doubles match against Richard Solberg and Clayton Alenik of UNLV.
Up next, the Vandals head to the Bulldog Classic on Oct. 27 in Spokane.
Jonah Baker can be reached at [email protected]