For the past two years, the men's tennis team has ruled the Ivy League, but over the weekend, the Bears' sovereignty was broken by two losses against Ivy League foes. After taking a 5-2 loss to No. 75 Princeton in its Ivy League opener on Friday, No. 69 Brown had another 5-2 loss to No. 74 University of Pennsylvania, with whom they shared last year's Ivy League title, on Saturday. Penn now shares first place with Harvard in the Ivy League standings, while Brown shares sixth place with Yale and Cornell.
"It wasn't our best weekend," said Head Coach Jay Harris. "We just couldn't find a way to play our best tennis. We fought hard and played pretty well, but it wasn't enough. Both matches were extremely tight. We just couldn't find a way to push through that door."
The Bears began Ivy League play by sweeping the doubles matches against the Tigers. At first doubles, the No. 53 duo of co-captain Dan Hanegby '07 and Saurabh Kohli '08 defeated Ted Mabrey and George Carpeni 8-4, and at second doubles, co-captain Eric Thomas '07 and Chris Lee '09 also triumphed 8-4 over Peter Capkovic and Alex Vuckovic. Zack Pasanen '07 and Noah Gardner '09 took an 8-4 win of their own at third doubles against Alex Krueger-Wyman and Sratha Saengsuwarn.
But in singles play, the Bears dropped their first four matches to give Princeton the four points it needed to win. At fourth singles, Kohli fell to Krueger-Wyman 6-3, 6-3, and at third singles, Thomas dropped his match 6-4, 6-4. Meanwhile, Hanegby faced off against No. 125 Capkovic at first singles, but after losing the first set in a tiebreaker, he dropped the second set as well to give Capkovic the 7-6, 6-3 win. At second singles, Basu Ratnam '09 battled Saengsuwarn in a three-set contest, which he eventually lost 6-4, 3-6, 6-4.
"We didn't win the big points," Thomas said. "That's what we really need to work on."
Pasanen gave Brown its only singles victory of the day, defeating Charlie Brosens 6-3, 6-4 at fifth singles. Lee, who competed while wearing a back brace after recently being diagnosed with stress fractures in his lower back, was forced to retire from the sixth singles match with Mabrey ahead 6-3, 2-2.
"We fought hard," said Joe Scott '08. "But I think we were just a little bit rusty in a few spots."
The next day, the Bears dropped the doubles point to begin their match against Penn. At second doubles, Thomas and Lee overpowered Jonathan Boym and Mikhail Bekker 8-4, but losses at first and third doubles gave the Quakers the point.
Brown had some closer matches in singles play. At first singles, Ratnam fell 6-2, 6-2 to No. 71 Jason Pinsky, but at fourth singles, Thomas soundly defeated Justin Fox 6-2, 6-3 to bring the score to 2-1.
"I jumped ahead early," Thomas said. "I didn't let (Fox) get into the match."
However, after Hanegby lost the second singles match 6-4, 6-2 to Boym, Kohli narrowly dropped the third singles match 6-4, 2-6, 6-4 to Bekker, giving Penn the win.
At sixth singles, Gardner gave Brown another win, prevailing 6-4, 6-4 over Alex Vasin, and at fifth singles, Pasanen lost a close match 6-3, 7-6 to Joseph Lok.
"It's tough, when the match is already over, to will yourself to win," Pasanen said.
The weekend's two losses put Brown into sixth place in the Ivy League. After Penn and Harvard tied at No. 1, Columbia and Princeton are tied for third, and Dartmouth is in fifth place. This will be the first time since 2000 that the Bears will finish with more than one loss during the Ivy League season.
"We're a long shot to win the Ivy League title," Pasanen said. "But this is the deepest I've seen the Ivy League."
Thomas echoed the sentiments of his teammate. "It's hard for one team to go undefeated," he said. "We just need to focus on one match at a time and regain our focus."
Next weekend, the Bears will travel to New York to compete against Cornell on Friday and Columbia on Saturday.
"We have a really tough trip next weekend," Harris said. "The bottom line is to find a way to play to our potential. We have to find that next gear. Right now, we're stuck in fourth gear in a five-gear car. Hopefully, we'll find a way to move into fifth gear."
