Southern Illinoise University Athletics
Men's Tennis Epure Leads SIU At Vandy
03/13/2001 | 12:00:00 | Men's Tennis
September 26, 2000
Murfreesboro, Tenn. -
The Southern Illinois University Carbondale top men's tennis player Valentin Epure battled not only injuries, but Vanderbilt's No. 1 seeded singles and doubles players to win the respect of his coach and his teammates at the Middle Tennessee Fall Invitational during the weekend.
Epure, a senior from Romania, is suffering from an injury on the hand he uses to swing his racket and is still recovering from an ankle injury he suffered last season.
"Val is suffering from an injury to his playing hand and what happens is that the longer he plays, the more it hurts," SIU coach Missy Jeffrey said. "It really hurts him on his serve, so in doubles he served second. After he lost to the No. 1 seed he came back to play the No. 5 seed in the consolation draw and that almost never happens, so that was kind of bad luck."
Epure came back against No. 1 seeded Eddie Coates of Vanderbilt in the A singles flight to win the second set 6-3 after dropping the first set 6-2. But his upset victory fell short as he dropped the third and deciding set 10-4. He then advanced to the consolation quarterfinals after winning in the consolation round of 16 by an injury withdrawal. He lost to the No. 5 seed Jerome LeBelicad of Mississippi State 6-1, 6-1.
"I think this proves that Val can compete against just about any player in the country," Jeffrey said. "Val was ranked in the top fifty in the world in boys 18's before he came to college and that alone gives him the confidence to know that he can beat anyone out there on any given day."
In the A flight of doubles, Epure teamed with fellow senior Dante Santa Cruz to make the semifinals before bowing out to Michael Chamberlain and Joe Schmulian of Memphis 8-4. But along the way, the duo defeated the No. 1 seeded doubles team of Coates and Bobby Reynolds in the quarterfinals 8-5 to extract some measure of revenge. Epure and Santa Cruz finished the tournament with a record of 3-1.
Epure finished with a 1-2 record in singles for the tournament while Santa Cruz had a better time in B flight singles compiling a 2-1 record before losing a hard fought match in the quarterfinals to Thomas Johansson of Evansville, 7-5, 5-7, 11-9.
The remainder of the Salukis' records in B flight singles were Alon Savidor (1-1) who lost in the round of 32 and Tim Marsh (1-1) who lost consolation round of 16. And in the C flight singles, Chris Carpenter finished 0-2 losing in the consolation round of 16.
In doubles, the team of Marsh and Savidor finished 1-1 losing in the quarterfinals to James McDonald and Mithur Murali of the University of Arkansas Little Rock 8-2.
The Salukis will return to action Friday-Saturday, Sept. 29-30 at the Billiken Fall Tennis Classic in St. Louis, Mo.
