No. 11 Tartans Win Again, Defeat No. 16 Pomona-Pitzer

(CLAREMONT, Calif.) - The 11th-ranked Carnegie Mellon University men's tennis team defeated 16th-ranked Pomona-Pitzer Colleges, 5-4, on Saturday, March 15 to closeout its spring break with a 5-1 record, with four wins coming against nationally ranked teams.

The Tartans had to battle back from a doubles deficit of 2-1 with the No. 2 pair of junior Bryce Beisswanger (Los Angeles, Calif./Viewpoint School) and sophomore Yuvraj Kumar (New Delhi, India/Millfield School) winning 8-4.

Sophomore Abhishek Alla (Hyderabad, India/IMG Pendleton School) gave the Tartans their second point with a 6-4, 6-0 win at No. 1 singles before freshman Kenny Zheng (Pennington, N.J./Hopewell Valley Central) put the Tartans up 3-2 with a 6-2, 6-3 win at No. 5 singles.

The Sagehens tied the match at 3-3 when freshman Kiril Kirkov (Tampa, Fla./C. Leon King) fell for the first time in six matches, 6-4, 4-6, 1-6, but the Tartans quickly regained the advantage when junior Will Duncan (Newbury Park, Calif./Newbury Park) won in three sets, 6-2, 3-6, 6-3 at No. 3 singles.

Freshman Kunal Wadwani (Saratoga, Calif./Ballarmine College Prep) earned the fifth and deciding point for the Tartans at No. 6 singles, 6-4, 6-2, as junior Christian Heaney-Secord (Westwood, Mass./Westwood) battled off 12 match points before falling 3-6, 7-6(7-5), 0-1 (4-10).

The Tartans are now 11-4 on the year and will next face fifth-ranked Johns Hopkins University on Saturday, March 22 at the University of Mary Washington at 12:00 p.m.