April 13, 2023 – Loras College men's tennis played its second match in as many days on Thursday afternoon as the Duhawks came away with a 6-3 victory over Cornell College in nonconference action.
The Duhawks (9-5) took two of three doubles matches and then took four singles matches, all in straight sets, to down the Rams (7-13) for the third time in the last four meetings between the teams.
Loras' senior duo of
Kevin Blomquist and
Konnor Barth claimed No. 1 doubles 8-3 while the No. 2 doubles tandem of freshman
Gage Becker and sophomore
Kareem Kassas won 8-1 to make easy work of their match.
The only doubles loss for Loras came down to a tiebreaker as senior
Sean Gelski and freshman
Lucas Healy couldn't hang on in a close battle with Edwin Holyoake and August Krahn. The Rams pairing prevailed 8-7 (8-6) one of the closer matches the Duhawks have seen as of late.
In singles, Loras dropped just two matches as Zachary Ong took the win by default over Barth at No. 3 and Blomquist fell in a tiebreaker at No. 1 to Alexander Hadler-Strumlauf. Blomquist fell 7-5 in the first set and flipped the script with a 7-5 win in the second set to force the tiebreaker, but he couldn't hang on in a 10-3 decision.
Loras' four singles wins were all in straight sets and were highlighted by a 6-3, 6-0 win for Becker at No. 2. His 6-0 win in his second set was the only shutout of the day for the Duhawks.
The Duhawks continue their busy stretch tomorrow, Friday April 14, when they host Simpson College for an American Rivers Conference (A-R-C) match at 4 P.M. at the Tucker Tennis Courts.
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