Feb. 23, 2007
Box Score
The University of Texas-Pan American men's tennis team earned a 5-2 victory against Nicholls State University on Friday (Feb. 23) at the Orville Cox Tennis Center on the UTPA campus in Edinburg, TX.
The Broncs improved to 3-5 on the season, picking up the point in doubles' action by winning two of the three matches in the early afternoon, and taking four of the six match-ups in singles' action.
"It feels great to win a conference match because our whole goal is still to make it to the conference tournament. The guys came back from behind in the doubles, and we had some very hard fought matches that could have gone either way," said head men's and women's tennis coach Rob Hubbard.
The freshman team of David Lopez-Heredia (Edinburg, TX/Edinburg H.S.) and Brett Bernstein (Sugarland, TX/Austin High School) defeated Vlad-Lucian Popa and Eric Fisher by an 8-6 count in top flight competition while Ivan Avila (Mexico City, Mexico/Texas Southern University) and Nirvick Mohinta (Calcutta, West Bengal, India/Univ. of New Orleans) out-lasted the duo of Phenyo Matong and Ricardo Van Bolderick by a score of 8-6 in the number-two spot.
The lone doubles' victory for the Colonels came when the UTPA tandem of Gary Bianco (Annecy, France/Lycee Berthollet) and Shashank Vij (Helsinki, Finland/Univ. of New Orleans) fell to Alexandru Gasca-Silav and Maxine Bouhoulle by an 8-2 count.
In singles' action, Bianco defeated Popa with a 6-3, 6-0 mark in the number-one spot while freshman Bernstein picked up his second victory of the day when he earned a 6-2, 6-3 decision over Bouhoulle.
In one of the more exciting match-ups of the day, Avila rallied back to pick up the victory over Fisher (2-6, 7-6 (6), 10-4) in a match that needed extra sets to be decided. In the number-four portion of the lineup, Mohinta earned the win against Gasca-Silav (6-4, 7-5) to claim the victory for the Broncs.
The Colonels picked up victories in two singles' matches on the day when Lopez fell to Matong (6-1, 4-6, 6-0) and Vij suffered a setback against Van Bolderick (6-2, 6-3).
The Broncs return to action on Sunday when they square-off against Southeastern Louisiana University with match-time set for 1:00 p.m. at the Orville Cox Tennis Center on the UTPA campus.
UTPA Sports Information
