Tribe Suffers Narrow Setback to No. 67 Minnesota

Juniors Dominic Pagon and Marwan Ramadan tallied three-set singles victories against the Gophers.

03/02/08 6:15PM

Boise, Idaho - Despite a promising start, the No. 38-ranked William and Mary men’s tennis team dropped its first match on a month-long road trip, 4-3, to No. 67 Minnesota at Boise State on Sunday afternoon. The Tribe claimed the doubles point, but the Golden Gophers took four singles slots to eek out the narrow victory. W&M fell to 11-5 on the year with the setback.

W&M notched victories at the No.1 and No. 3 doubles spots to take the initial point of the match. The duo of senior Kavi Sud and freshman Sebastien Vidal improved to 9-1 overall on the season with an 8-2 win over Pierre Dumas and Chi-Lang Pham at the No. 3 position. The College’s top tandem of senior Alex Cojanu and sophomore Keziel Juneau clinched the doubles point with an 8-6 victory over Raoul Schwark and Tobias Wernet. Cojanu and Juneau, who are ranked No. 16 nationally, improved to 10-7 on the year.

After Minnesota took the lead with a trio of straight-set victories in singles at the No. 1, No. 3 and No. 4 slots, the match came down to a trio of three-set affairs. Despite tallying wins at the No. 2 and No. 5 positions, the Tribe’s chances at the team win came to a close with the Gophers three-set victory at the No. 6 spot.

Junior Dominic Pagon upped his team-leading singles win total to 18 with his fourth three-set victory of the season. After dropping the opening set, 6-2, to Wernet at the No. 2 spot, the Kingston, Jamaica native rallied to take the final two sets and the win, 7-6, 6-4.

Fellow classmate Marwan Ramadan also rallied for a three-set victory at the No. 5 spot. Ramadan, who has won six of his last seven matches, improved to 17-8 overall on the year with a 5-7, 6-4, 6-2 win over Dumas.

The Tribe will wrap up its two-game trip to Idaho when it meets No. 41 Boise State on Monday, March 3, at 3 p.m. W&M will also travel to No. 3 Georgia during the week on Wednesday, March 5, at 2:30 p.m.

#67 Minnesota 4, #38 William and Mary 3
Singles
No. 1 – #46 Raoul Schwark (Minn) def. Alex Cojanu (W&M) – 6-2, 6-4
No. 2 – Dominic Pagon (W&M) def. Tobias Wernet (Minn) – 2-6, 7-6, 6-4
No. 3 – Sebastian Gallego (Minn) def. Keziel Juneau (W&M) – 6-2, 6-3
No. 4 – Dino Bilankov (Minn) def. Sebastien Vidal (W&M) – 6-0, 6-3
No. 5 – Marwan Ramadan (W&M) def. Pierre Dumas (Minn) – 5-7, 6-4, 6-2
No. 6 – Chi-Lang Pham (Minn) def. Richard Wardell (W&M) –7-6, 0-6, 6-3
Finishing Order: 4, 3, 1, 6*, 2, 5

Doubles
No. 1 – #16 Cojanu/Juneau (W&M) def. Schwark/Wernet (Minn.) – 8-6
No. 2 – Bilankov/Gallego (Minn.) def. Wardell/Pagon (W&M) – 9-7
No. 3 – Kavi Sud/Vidal (W&M) def. Dumas/Pham (Minn.) – 8-2
Finishing Order: 3, 1*, 2