Oct. 14, 2011
COLUMBUS, Ohio - The Northern Illinois men's tennis team had one of its most successful days in program history, winning a doubles and singles match in the main draw of the ITA Midwest Regional. Individually Axel Lagerlof (Malmo, Sweden/Malmo Borgar School) advanced to the round of 32 and Maksym Bartiuk (Ukraine/Specialised School No. 76) and Roman Turtygin (Russia/No. 156 with Profound Studies of Arts) advanced in doubles.
"It was a good day for Huskie Tennis," said Head Coach Patrick Fisher "Our guy's played and beat some of best players in the country today."
Opening the day, Lagerlof took on Ohio State's Wyatt Lippert, playing with a home court advantage, and quickly dropped his first set 6-0. The Malmo, Sweden native switched his style of play, attacking more and waiting less, and took the next two sets, 6-4, 6-2, to advance to the main draw.
"If Axel hadn't switched his style of play, I don't know what would have happened, but, he made strides with his game in the match by attacking more," recalled Fisher after Lagerlof's successful morning.
Lagerlof would follow up with a match later in the day and again claim victory over Wisconsin's No. 1 player Billy Bertha, another Big-10 foe, and defeat Bertha in two sets, 6-3, 6-4. Lagerlof will take on Illinois' Stephen Hoh tomorrow morning, the tournament's No. 15 seed, starting at 7 a.m.
Bartiuk took on the tournament's 14th seed in Notre Dame's Samuel Keeton and fought hard with the Fighting Irish player, but fell in straight sets 7-6, 6-3.
"Maksym had a ton of chances to win his match today and he had set points in the first set, serving up 2-0 in the second set and ready to be 3-0, when momentum shifted and he could not get back on track. He showed today that he's capable of playing with the best players in the country."
In the doubles bracket, the Huskies also found success with Bartiuk and Turtygin teaming up to defeat IPFW's Tim Saltys and Connor Andrews, 8-6, while Lagerlof and partner Max Phillips fell to Marquette's Vukasin Teofanovic and Logon Collins, 8-3.
The duo of Bartiuk and Turtygin will play 12th seed Kevin Metka and Steven Williams of Ohio State.
Live stats of both the Huskies' matches can be viewed at OhioStateBuckeyes.com.
