GOSHEN, Ind. — Aritha Weerasinghe closed out the home portion of his college tennis career with his 54th and 55th wins on Saturday, but those victories accounted for half of Goshen College's team score in a 5-4 Crossroads League loss to Huntington University.
The Foresters (9-3, 7-2) wedged their way into a second-place tie with Marian University behind two wins each from Ignacio Poncio and Rodrigo Manzo, who claimed straight-set wins at the top two singles spots; each man also formed half of a winning doubles duo, again with Poncio at no. 1 and Manzo at no. 2.
None of the three doubles matches was decided by a margin closer than 8-3, with the two sides splitting 8-2 wins at the bottom two spots before the Foresters won 8-3 at the lead position.
In singles action, the first match off the court was, somehow, one of the two three-setters on the afternoon. Evan Beck pulled Goshen (6-5, 5-4) back to level in the team match with a 1-6, 6-3, 6-3 win before the Foresters got straight-set wins at no. 1 and no. 5 to lead 4-2.
Kartikeya Sharma got a point back at no. 3 singles for GC, continuing a trend that sent the Maple Leafs to 27-6 this season at the second, third and fourth positions. Weerasinghe held up his end of the bargain as well with a three-set victory at the fourth spot, but the point had been rendered moot as Manzo finished off Juan Miguel Ciudad after a first-set tiebreak to seal the match for Huntington.
The loss dropped Goshen into fifth place in the conference standings, sending the team on the road to fourth-seeded Spring Arbor in the conference tournament quarterfinals: first serve is set for 3:15 p.m. Tuesday at the Jones Tennis Complex. Despite the road trip, the fifth-place finish represents the fourth time in five years that GC has finished at or above the middle of the conference.
Full Results: Huntington 5, Goshen 4
Singles
1. Ignacio Poncio (HU) def. Eric Zuercher 6-0, 6-2
2. Rodrigo Manzo (HU) def. Juan Miguel Ciudad 7-6, 6-4
3. Kartikeya Sharma (GC) def. Giovanni Martinez 6-3, 6-1
4. Aritha Weerasinghe (GC) def. Mariano Echevarria 6-2, 3-6, 7-5
5. Jacob Shetler (HU) def. Lukas Kanther 6-4, 6-2
6. Evan Beck (GC) def. Brody Worl 1-6, 6-3, 6-3
Doubles
1. Echevarria/Poncio (HU) def. Ciudad/Sharma 8-3
2. Manzo/Martinez (HU) def. Knather/Luke Rush 8-2
3. Weerasinghe/Zuercher (GC) def. Buttermore/Shetler 8-2
(An earlier version of this story referred to Aritha Weerasinghe as Goshen's lone senior. Joel Gerig is also a senior but was not in the Maple Leaf lineup on Saturday. We regret the error.)
