Boppana Advances to ITA Regional Singles Semifinal

(FREDERICKSBURG, Va.) - The Carnegie Mellon University men's tennis team had eight members compete at the Intercollegiate Tennis Association (ITA) Southeast Regional with play beginning Friday, October 4. After Saturday's rounds, junior Ray Boppana (Boxborough, Mass. / Acton Boxborough Regional) advanced to the semifinals which will be played on Sunday, October 6.

Boppana, who played for the regional title as a freshman and is seeded fourth this year, won twice on Friday and opened Saturday with a win in the round of 16. Boppana's first win came by a 6-0, 6-0 score against Philip Szkudlarski of Stevens Institute of Technology. The junior then defeated Aaron Carey of Johns Hopkins University, 6-1, 6-2. Boppanna continued the tournament with a 6-3, 6-1 win against Kevin Yan of Haverford College before facing Austin Gu of Johns Hopkins in the quarterfinals. Boppana was victorious in a three-set match after falling beind 6-2. He won the final two sets, 6-2, 7-5, and will face Alexander Angradi of Salisbury University on Sunday at 9:30 a.m.

Sophomore Sam Gibson (Chico, Calif. / Pleasant Valley) won his first two contests before falling in the round of 16 to the one-seed, Dominic Lacombe of Christopher Newport University, 6-4, 6-1. Gibson, seeded ninth, won 7-5, 6-3 against Tetsuya Ota from Goucher in the round of 64 and 6-4, 6-3 in the round of 32 against Daniel Blonquist of Southern Virginia University.

In doubles play, freshman Raahil Doshi (Singapore, Singapore / Anglo - Chinese School (Independent), Singapore) and junior Joshua Pinckney (Atlanta, Ga. / The Westminster Schools) won 8-4 in the opening round against a pair from Stevens while the first-year duo of Edward Chen (Boston, Mass. / Shanghai American School) and Matthew Poh (Manhattan Beach, Calif. / Mira Costa) won 8-3 in the first round against Washington and Lee University's Julian Hadad and Mitchell Thomas.

Gibson paired with freshman Jonathan Nottingham (Philadelphia, Pa. / Masterman High School) to also wiin in the first round, topping Thibault Verneir and Stephen Wong of Swathmore College, 8-4. All three pairs lost in the round of 16 to seeded opponents.