Southern Illinoise University Athletics
Southern Illinois University
MVC Individual Tournament
Men's Tennis wraps up play at MVC Individual Championships
01/22/2012 | 12:00:00 | Men's Tennis
Jan. 22, 2012
By Tyler Wooten
SIUSalukis.com
DES MOINES, Iowa -- The Southern Illinois Men's Tennis team concluded play Sunday at the State Farm Missouri Valley Individual Championships, advancing players into four singles and two doubles semifinals, but falling short of grabbing the first Saluki individual title since 2009.
In doubles semifinals play Sunday were the nationally ranked duo of junior Brandon Florez and Martijn Admiraal, and the tandem of junior Orhan Spahic and freshman Szymon Opieczonek. The No. 42 team of Florez/Admiraal lost their first match together since October to Illinois State's Willi Peter and Jordan Badenko, 9-7. Spahic and Opieczonek dropped to 0-2 overall, falling to the eventual Flight Three champions from Drake, Anis Ghorbel and Cesar Bracho, 8-6.
"In doubles, everybody basically had a new partner," said Head Coach Dann Nelson. "Those teams just need to gel more and we need to tweak a few more things to their game and go from there. Things just didn't go our way today."
Overall, the Salukis went 7-22 in both singles and doubles, but their performance wasn't without highlights. Junior transfer Badr Cherradi defeated the 66th-ranked player in the nation (as ranked by the ITA), Mattheus Pereira of Wichita State, 6-3, 6-4.
Cherradi, who filled in for injured reigning MVC Freshman of the Year Jorge Cavero at the No. 1 singles spot, also fought the highest ranked player in Des Moines in the Flight One semifinals, Drake's Anis Ghorbel (No. 51), but fell, 6-3, 6-3. Ghorbel went on to take the flight crown, one of eight individual titles the 63rd-ranked Drake took home out of a possible ten.
"With Jorge out, we had to have some people step up," Nelson said. "Badr did a great job for us at the top spot. He played (Ghorbel) tough, and there were a lot of people wondering who this new guy we have is. Everybody has to step up, though, with Jorge out."
"There were many ups and downs," Nelson said. "There were some good things we did. We made four semifinals, and that was one of our goals. We achieved that goal, but we just didn't play well enough to get into the finals. Our guys are playing tough, we just have to work on our game more to be able to win those matches."
The Salukis will open their spring dual match season with a doubleheader against Purdue and Butler in West Lafayette, Ind., on Feb. 4.
Players Mentioned
