No. 7 Tartans Win Eighth Straight Match Defeating No. 27 Mary Washington

(FREDERICKSBURG, Va.) – The Carnegie Mellon University men's tennis team, ranked seventh nationally, traveled to Fredericksburg, Virginia, to play 27th-ranked University of Mary Washington  Sunday, April 10. The Tartans won their eighth straight match defeating the Eagles, 7-2, to improve to 14-5 while Mary Washington is now 15-8.

Carnegie Mellon led 2-1 following doubles play with wins at No. 1 and No. 3.  The senior tandem of Yuvraj Kumar (New Delhi, India/Millfield School) and Abhishek Alla (Hyderabad, India/IMG Pendleton School) grabbed the Tartans first point of the match with an 8-2 win in the number three spot. The Tartans then went ahead 2-0 with an 8-6 victory at No. 1 by the freshmen pair of Daniel Levine (Highland Park, Ill./Boca Prep International School) and Vayum Arora (Fremont, Calif./Mission San Jose).

Freshman Chaz Downing (Newport Beach, Calif./Corona Del Mar) gave the Tartans a 3-1 lead with a straight set victory at No. 3 singles, winning 6-1, 6-2. The Tartans' fourth team point came when Kumar won 6-4, 6-4 at No. 6 singles.

The Eagles cut the lead to 4-2 with a win at fifth singles, but straight set wins by Alla and Levine at No. 1 and No. 2 singles, respectively, gave the Tartans a 6-2 lead and sealed the win. Junior Kenny Zheng (Pennington, N.J./Hopewell Valley Central) earned Carnegie Mellon's seventh point with a three-set win at No. 4 singles. Zheng won by the scores of 3-6, 6-1, 6-1.

Combined with the women's victory against Mary Washington on Sunday, head coach Andrew Girard collected his 400th career win.

The Tartans will be off two weeks before traveling south to Florida for the University Athletic Association (UAA) Championships. Play begins on Thursday, April 21 with the draw for the tournament due out next week.