WEST PALM BEACH, Fla. – The No. 15/3-seed Florida Southern College men's tennis team won its first Sunshine State Conference tournament match since 2013 with a 4-2 win over No. 48/6-seed Lynn University in the SSC quarterfinal on Friday morning at the Mitch Gornto Tennis Center.
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The Moccasins (16-7, 4-3 SSC) rallied in singles, highlighted by a win by
Mario Garoz to tie a single season record in match win (20 – Patrick Ney, 1998). The Fighting Knights (9-8, 2-5 SSC) won doubles but could not stop the Mocs in singles with a rally by FSC to advance in the tournament. This was the conference tournament win since the 2013 season when the Mocs beat Florida Tech 5-2 in a backdraw match for fifth place. Today's win also marked the first season since 2008 in which the Mocs won 16+ games in a single season.
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The doubles competition was a close fight for the first team point as Lynn opened with a 6-4 win over
Bosko Boskovic and
George Russell. The No. 41 pairing of
Chris Fok Kow and Garoz evened the score with a 6-4 win over the No. 18 pairing of Davide Cortimiglia and Alessio Demichelis. The point was decided by the #3 court of
Sam Frizelle and
Matthew Hewitt, who narrowly missed in a 7-6 loss.
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The match turned to singles, opening with the win by Garoz 6-2, 6-4 over Santino Morel. Boskovic then had a 6-4, 6-0 win over Daniel Azar and a 6-4, 6-4 win by Fok Kow over Aymen Alimoussa. The first court win for the Fighting Knights came in a third set win by Demichelis, overcoming a set one win by Frizelle. After dropping the first set 7-6 at #5 for Russell against Lennart Ostheimer, Russell rallied in the second set, down 4-1, to win 6-4 in set two and another win in set three, 6-4, to clinch the match. Splitting the first two sets, Hewitt's court went unfinished, with the match clinched with a 4-2 FSC win.Â
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The Mocs advance to the SSC semifinal to take on No. 10 Saint Leo University tomorrow, April 26, set for a 9 a.m. start at the Mitch Gornto Tennis Center. Â
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