Flushing, N.Y. - On Friday (Apr. 21) afternoon, the Queens College men's tennis team matched up against defending 2022 champions Saint Thomas Aquinas College Spartans inside the QC Tennis Bubble for the East Coast Conference Championship.
Matching up against the Spartans for the fourth straight championship match, Queens were in search of their fifth title in six seasons while looking to avenge last season's heartbreaking loss.
After taking an early 1-0 lead following their doubles victory, the Knights used three singles victories (No. 2, No. 5, No. 6) to dethrone the defending champions to return to the mountaintop with a convincing 4-0 victory Friday afternoon.
With the win, head coach Somadi Druker and the Knights improved their overall record to 15-4 on the season. Under Druker's guidance, the Knights clinched their fifth title in six seasons, while claiming their overall ninth ECC championship crown in program history.
During the regular season, both sides split the season series as the Spartans defeated the Knights on their home court to the score of 4-2 on Friday (Mar. 24) afternoon before Queens earned a 4-3 road victory on Tuesday (Apr. 4) afternoon to hand the Spartans their first loss of the season as both teams earned a share of the ECC Regular Season Title.
Playing in front of a packed and supporting home crowd, it was the Knights who got off to a strong start in the doubles competition to set the tone.
In a matchup between two evenly matched teams, Queens No. 1 doubles pair of junior Roni Rikkonen (Tampere, Finland) and senior Kareem Rashad (Alexandria, Egypt) used a 6-1 victory over Ody Papaioannou and Ludovico Truffelli to give the Knights an early 1-0 lead.
But the Spartans would tie the match 1-1 as the No. 2 pair of graduate student Lluis Miralles Miro (Barcelona, Spain) and senior Lucas Demuth (Buenos Aires, Argentina) fell 6-2 to the Spartans pair of Dom Lominoque and Tobias Fuerschuss.
Down to the final doubles match, the No. 3 Knights pair of senior Moritz Borges (Hunxe, Germany) and junior Omar El Shehawey (Cairo, Egypt) would clinch the doubles point with a 6-4 victory over Ondrej Sramek and Tony Khamassi as the Knights took a 1-0 lead into singles play.
In last year's championship match, the Knights took the early 1-0 lead following their double victory before they fell short in singles play.
But fast forward a year later, Queens would ensure there would be no repeat of last year's heartbreaking loss as the Knights took command early on by winning the first set at all six singles matches.
Queens would double their advantage to 2-0 as the Finland native Rikkonen fought back from being down 2-1 in the first set at No. 2 singles for a two-set victory over Truffelli to the score of 6-3, 6-3.
At No. 5 singles, Borges would swiftly turn up the pressure as Queens took a commanding lead of 3-0 as he defeated Lennart Lehmann to the score of 6-3, 6-4 as the Knights were now one match away from clinching the title.
As the Spartans forced a third set at No. 1 and No. 4 singles, Rashad and senior Mariano Bibiloni (La Plata, Argentina) inched closer to victory.
At No. 3 singles Rashad earned a 6-3 first set victory over Fuerschuss, while at No. 6 singles, Bibiloni fought back against Alberto Navarro with a 6-4 first set victory.
With Rashad leading 5-4 in the second set, Bibiloni would deliver with the winning point as the senior defeated Navarro to the score of 7-5 in the second set as the Knights swept the defending champions to the score of 4-0 to clinch the title.
Provided by the Queens Sports Information Department.
