UPLAND, Ind. — Eric Zuercher and Eric Cender each won singles matches for the Goshen College men's tennis team Saturday, but Taylor University won the final match on court, between two players not named Eric, to claim the 5-4 victory in a Crossroads League match.
Aritha Weerasinghe and Luke Rush claimed Goshen a doubles point at no. 2 with an 8-4 win, but Taylor (5-4, 5-2) won 8-2 at the other two positions to take a 2-1 lead into singles play.
The hosts added a pair of quick wins at no. 1 and no. 6 to push the team edge to 4-1, with the usual nine-match slate meaning that the first team to win five claimed the overall victory. And while the Trojans had won the first set 6-1 at no. 4, Goshen (4-8, 3-5) had other ideas about going quietly into the Grant County early afternoon.
Juan Miguel Ciudad came back from his early deficit to level the match with a 6-3 win at no. 4. Before Ciudad could finish off his win (6-4 in the third), Zuercher bounced back and regained his early form to post a 6-1, 1-6, 6-2 win at the second spot. Soon thereafter, Eric Cender finished off a third-set win in a tiebreaker to level the team match at 4-4.
On a day with three three-set matches, all of which played full third sets to six games, the last match on the court finished in straight sets. Andre Danelli of Taylor and Kartikeya Sharma of Goshen took both of the first two sets to their maximum possible length, with Danelli claiming both in tiebreakers for a 7-6, 7-6 win.
Because the Crossroads League has an odd number of tennis programs, each team is slated for a bye on one of the nine dates in conference play. Goshen's bye this year comes next Tuesday, the last regular match day of the season, which means the Maple Leafs are the first team to finish their CL slate.
Saturday's loss and the conference tiebreakers mean that Goshen is assured of a spot in the Crossroads League tournament, but that while GC can finish as high as a tie for fifth, it is locked into the seventh seed. The Maple Leafs' first-round opponent will be either Indiana Wesleyan or Taylor, both teams with which GC played 5-4 regular-season matches but will not be known until at least Tuesday.
Taylor 5, Goshen 4
1S. Juan Ramirez (T) def. Aritha Weerasinghe 6-2, 6-1
2S. Eric Zuercher (G) def. Stephen All 6-1, 1-6, 6-2
3S. Andre Danelli (T) def. Kartikeya Sharma 7-6, 7-6
4S. Juan Miguel Ciudad (G) def. Salvador Lo Cascio 1-6, 6-3, 6-4
5S. Eric Cender (G) def. Chris Robbins 6-2, 2-6, 7-6(4)
6S. Victor Cheng (T) def. Evan Beck 6-4, 6-1
1D. Ramirez/Alex Jung (T) def. Zuercher/Sharma 8-2
2D. Weerasinghe/Luke Rush (G) def. Danelli/Robbins 8-4
3D. All/Lo Cascio (T) def. Ciudad/Cender 8-2
