Savannah, Ga. – The sixth-ranked Concordia College men's tennis team visited the fifth-ranked Armstrong Atlantic Pirates on Friday afternoon for a top-10 match against two of the strongest programs in NCAA Division II. The Clippers would come away with a 7-2 victory against a shorthanded Armstrong team as Concordia earned their first ever win in program history against the Pirates.
Armstrong only dressed four players as the Clippers would lead 3-0 by walkover in the No. 3 doubles, No. 5 singles, and No. 6 singles matches. In the remaining two singles matches the action would be highly competitive. The No. 1 duo of junior Benas Majauskas (Vilnius, Lithuania) and senior Daniele Piludu (Cagliari, Italy) would battle their way to a 9-7 win against Luca Cerin and Jaan Kononov as did the No. 2 duo of junior Juuso Ojanen (Varkaus, Finland) and freshman Pulat Babadjanov (Tashkent, Uzbekistan) against Ignacio Hernandez and Damian Okrutny.
In singles play Concordia would begin with a 4-6, 6-0, 10-1 win in the No. 4 match as junior Tomasz Olfans (Opole, Poland) defeated Okrutny. Ojanen, in his No. 1 match, would earn the final victory for the Clippers as he secured a hard fought 4-6, 7-6 (7-2), 10-5 win against Kononov.
The Pirates would claim two of the singles matches as Hernandez defeated Piludu, the sixth-ranked singles player in the nation, 7-6 (8-6), 2-6, 10-4 in the No. 2 match and Cerin won in the No. 3 match over sophomore Ofir Ginat (Raa'nana, Israel) 6-3, 6-3.
With the win head coach Neil Tarangioli now has 498 career victories as a head coach of the men's program.
Concordia (8-2, 2-0 CACC) will close out their trip away from New York tomorrow morning with a match at No. 29 Francis Marion. The match is set to begin at 10 a.m. and a full recap and results will be made available at the conclusion of the match on ConcordiaClippers.com.