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Jimmy Chu made his first appearance of the season.

Men's Tennis

Men's Tennis Drops 5-2 Decision at Illinois State

March 21, 2009

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NORMAL, Ill. - The Northern Illinois men's tennis team picked up wins at both the No. 5 and No. 6 singles positions, but fell in a 5-2 decision at Illinois State Saturday afternoon. ISU secured the decisive doubles point, and pulled out three, three-set wins in singles competition.

"We lost a very competitive match today, and the story really was us not taking advantage of our opportunities, both in singles and doubles," said NIU head coach Pawel Gajdzik. "You have to give Illinois State credit. We had some key opportunities to take control of the match, and they really responded, grinding out some hard-fought matches.

"We certainly learned a lot today, having three of our singles matches extend to three-sets. That experience should serve us well the rest of the season. We have our work cut out for us tomorrow in a quick turnaround at Marquette. We will be playing indoors, so that will present another challenge."

NIU dropped all three doubles matches in pro-set decisions. Jurica Grubisic and Pawel Poziomski lost at the No. 1 flight, 8-5; Shaun Stewart teamed with Ross VanderPloeg and No. 2 and dropped an 8-6 decision, followed by a hard-fought, 8-7 loss by Matt Hansen and Jimmy Chu at No. 3 doubles. The match marked the first appearance of the season for Chu.

In singles play, the Redbirds recorded wins in the top-four positions, including three-set victories at each the No. 1, No. 2 and No. 4 flights. Grubisic, the Huskies' top singles player, blanked the Redbirds' Timon Reichelt (6-0) in the opening set, but Reichelt fought back with respective 6-0, 6-1 wins in the ensuing two sets to record the victory.

Poziomski, playing No. 2 singles, also tallied a first-set win, outlasting ISU's Filip Miljevic, 6-4, but fell by respective 6-2, 6-3 scores in the final two sets. Stewart also fell in a three-set decision at the fourth singles position, 6-4, 6-7 and 10-8 in a third-set super tiebreaker.

NIU's Javier Bernabe and VanderPloeg each won three-set matches at the respective No. 5 and No. 6 singles flights to secure the Huskies' two team points in the dual match.

NIU will continue non-conference play Sunday (March 22), when the Huskies travel to Milwaukee to take on host Marquette, beginning at 1 p.m. CST.

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