W&M Knocks off Highest Ranked Foe of Season, Downs Irish for First Time in 30 years

Junior Dominic Pagon clinched the Tribe victory with his 19th win of the season at the No. 3 singles position.

04/06/08 4:35PM

South Bend, Ind. - For the first time since 1978, the No. 63 William and Mary men’s tennis team upset No. 34 Notre Dame, 4-3, on Sunday afternoon in South Bend, Ind. The Tribe snapped a seven-match losing streak to the Irish, knocking off its highest-ranked foe of the season. Notre Dame has spent much of the 2008 season among the top-20 in the country, including a ranking as high as No. 9 this season, but the Green and Gold won the doubles point and received singles wins from senior Alex Cojanu, sophomore Keziel Juneau and junior Dominic Pagon to clinch the team triumph. The Tribe improved to 13-11 overall on the yea, while the Irish fell to 11-9.

“The team overcame a tremendous amount of adversity to beat a good Notre Dame team that is well coached by Bob Bayliss,” head coach Peter Daub said. “Having lost eight of our last nine and having Dominic Pagon, who had lost his last seven matches, it showed great resolve by both our team and Dominic to fight through a lack of confidence to pull out the victory against a quality opponent today. We caught Notre Dame on a bit of a down day, but I give our players a lot of credit for rising to the challenge and playing well in victory.”

The College opened the match by taking the critical doubles point with wins at the No. 1 and No. 3 positions. The Tribe’s top pair of senior Alex Cojanu and junior Dominic Pagon got the Green and Gold off on the right foot with an impressive 8-2 victory over No. 54-ranked Brett Helgeson and Sheeva Pabhu. Cojanu and Pagon evened their ledger at 3-3 on the year with all three triumphs over nationally ranked opponents.

After the Irish knotted the pairs’ competition with a win at the No. 2 slot, the Tribe tandem of senior Kavi Sud and freshman Sebastien Vidal clinched the point, downing Stephen Haves and Tyler Davis, 8-5 at the No. 3 spot. The win pushed the W&M pairs’ season ledger to 14-3. The doubles win was the 26th of the season for Vidal, which tied him for second on the W&M freshman doubles victories list with Geoff Russell.

Notre Dame quickly evened the tilt with a straight sets win at the No. 2 singles position, before the two teams traded singles victories to tighten the contest to 3-3. Sophomore Keziel Juneau tallied his 14th win of the year at the No. 4 slot, upending Stephen Havens, 6-4, 6-3, before Cojanu recorded his 10th career win over a nationally ranked opponent at the No. 1 spot. The Hallandale, Fla., native avenged a loss earlier this season by disposing of No. 42-ranked Brett Helgeson, 6-1, 6-4. The win was his 10th dual match victory of the season and his 14th overall.

The balance of the contest came down to the No. 3 position which pit the Tribe’s Dominic Pagon with Notre Dame’s Andrew Roth. Pagon broke out of a recent funk and garnered a bit of revenge over Roth with a 7-6 (5), 6-4 win to clinch the College’s victory. Roth had defeated Pagon during the fall at the Tribe Invitational, but the Tribe junior snapped a seven-match losing streak with his 19th singles win of the year. The 19 singles wins matched the total from his first two injury-plagued seasons at W&M.

The Tribe returns to action with its final two home matches of the 2008 season on Friday, April 11. The College will host South Alabama at 2 p.m., before welcoming Howard to Busch Courts at 6:30 p.m. W&M will honor its pair of seniors Alex Cojanu and Kavi Sud, who will be taking part in their the final home affairs of their Tribe careers.

#63 William and Mary 4, #34 Notre Dame 3
Singles
No. 1 - Alex Cojanu (W&M) def. #42 Brett Helgeson (ND) - 6-1, 6-4
No. 2 - #93 Sheeva Parbhu (ND) def. Marwan Ramadan (W&M) - 6-1, 6-1
No. 3 - Dominic Pagon (W&M) def. Andrew Roth (ND) - 7-6 (5), 6-4
No. 4 - Keziel Juneau (W&M) def. Stephen Havens (ND) - 6-4, 6-3
No. 5 - David Anderson (ND) def. Sebastien Vidal (W&M) - 6-2, 6-4
No. 6 - Daniel Stahl (ND) def. Kavi Sud (W&M) - 7-6 (1), 6-3
Finishing Order: 2, 4, 5, 1, 6, 3*

Doubles
No. 1 - Cojanu/ Pagon (W&M) def. #54 Helgeson/Parbhu (ND) - 8-2
No. 2 - Roth/Santiago Montoya (ND) def. Varun Pandit/Juneau (W&M) - 8-4
No. 3 - Sud/Vidal (W&M) def. Havens/Tyler Davis (ND) - 8-5
Finishing Order: 1, 2, 3*