M. Tennis earns weekend split of Ivy road matches

The Penn men's tennis team was victorious in coach Gordie Ernst's return to his alma mater. Gordie Ernst, coach of the Penn men's tennis team, threatened his players early in the year that if they lost their match to Brown they would have to walk home. It's a good thing they won -- the match was played on the road. The Quakers (10-5, 2-3 Ivy League) split their weekend matches, beating the Bears 4-3 on Friday before succumbing 5-2 at Yale the following day. Brown was an important match to the Quakers for a variety of reasons. Ernst, returning to his alma mater as Penn's head coach for the first time, wanted to prove his ability as a coach. The athletes, coming off two losses last weekend to Navy and Princeton, wanted to prove their ability as tennis players. Both achieved their goals as the Quakers turned back the Bears (12-2, 0-1) in a close match. The Red and Blue won the doubles point, as the duo of junior Uday Garg and sophomore Rob Pringle, a Daily Pennsylvanian staff photographer, won 8-6 at No. 2, and sophomore Eric Sobotka and freshman Brian Barki won easily at No. 3 by a score of 8-2. In singles, No. 2 Sobotka came away with another win, defeating Brown's Chris Wolfe 7-6, 6-2. However, the heroes of the day were Barki and junior Brett Meringoff -- the last two Quakers to play. When Meringoff and Barki took the court, Brown was up 3-2 and needed just one more match to pull off the win. Meringoff lost his first set and soon found himself trailing 5-2 in the second. Playing as if he was taking Ernst's threat to make the team walk home to heart, Meringoff came away with a spectacular come-from-behind victory. Penn's No. 4 wound up winning the second set 7-6. He then clinched the match with a 6-4 third set victory. "Brett was down to match point and Brown was tasting the win," Ernst said. "The food was on the plate and Brett just said, 'No soup for you!'" Equally impressive was Barki; as the last player on the court, he had the entire match resting on his shoulders. Never one to crumble under pressure, he won a tight 7-6, 7-6 match at No. 5. "Brian is just a rock for us. He shows a lot of poise. He is someone I can personally look to and see how to stay cool under pressure," Sobotka said. "He came up with some huge shots this weekend. He doesn't get too excited -- he stays poised and calm, but very intense, which is exactly the balance you need to be a good tennis player. "Whenever the match is on the line, Brian is the guy you want out there." After Friday's exciting win, the Quakers were in for a let-down in New Haven as the Elis, undefeated in Ivy play, snapped Penn's win streak at one. The Quakers came out slow on Saturday, losing all three doubles matches. They missed a costly opportunity to win the coveted doubles point when the Nos. 1 and 2 teams lost their respective matches, 8-6. "Not winning the doubles point is a big deal," senior captain Jordan Szekely said. "If we win the doubles point it puts more pressure on them and changes the whole chemistry of the match." After losing at No. 3 doubles, Sobotka came back in singles and emerged victorious, winning in three sets, 7-5, 2-6, 7-5. Szekely, recovering from a disappointing showing at Brown -- where he lost both his doubles and singles matches-- won his No. 4 singles match in straight sets, 6-3, 7-5. "Although I was disappointed that we lost with Yale, there were some bright points. For one, Eric Sobotka played his best tennis of the year," Ernst said. "Furthermore, Jordan bounced back against Yale on a tough, windy day. "Jordan's the type of guy that if he shows up for every match could go undefeated." While individual members of the team played well, the Quakers as a whole found the result of the Yale match very disappointing. "Yale is a good team and we knew that we were the underdogs in the match and that we had to give it all we had," Barki said. "We were up in doubles and we should have won but we got sloppy and let that slip away. "The loss hurts that much more because we knew were so close to beating them." While the results of the weekend may not have been exactly what the Quakers were hoping for, the team is now gearing up for another important weekend in which it faces two more Ivy foes -- Dartmouth and Harvard. But first, the Red and Blue will try to work out some kinks today as Rutgers travels to the Lott courts to take on the Quakers at 3 p.m. The Rutgers match is a welcome break from the rigors of Ivy competition. While Penn has easily disposed of the Scarlet Knights (7-5) in years past, Rutgers is solid this year and not to be overlooked. "We have to be very focused. If we all stay focused and play well, we're going to come away with an easy win. If not, it's going to be a dogfight," Sobotka said. "It's not like we're coming off a huge win streak -- we dropped matches to Navy, Princeton and Yale. "There's absolutely no reason for us to be cocky against these guys." If the team remains focused and intense, a win today would be exactly the type of confidence booster the team needs heading into the upcoming weekend of Ivy matchups.