De Alwis, a sophomore, is a Sri Lankan native who has had an interesting path to Penn, including stops in international play and learning the game in other countries.

Coach David Geatz and his staff successfully recruited five new freshmen from across the country.

Though the Penn men’s and women’s tennis teams achieved mostly mediocre results last year,  there were plenty of happy moments to go around. Here are the top five.

In the program’s first ever match against the Redbirds (4-3), the injury-riddled Quakers (1-5) fought hard across the board, but ultimately the team was not able to win the close matchups it needed, falling 5-2 on Sunday.

Penn (9-11, 1-6 Ivy) lost to the Lions (15-7, 5-2) in New York by the slimmest of margins, 4-3. The Quakers then dropped Sunday’s match to No. 51 Cornell (14-8, 3-4), 5-2.

The birds are chirping and the sun is shining, but the Penn men’s tennis team is still practicing indoors — an unfortunate consequence of circumstances completely outside their control.

The four newcomers on the Penn men’s tennis team have found the transition to playing college tennis nothing but smooth.

Matched up with two of the toughest teams in the Ivy League at the Hamlin Tennis Center, the Penn men’s tennis team defeated No. 70 Dartmouth on Saturday before falling to No. 19 Harvard in a heartbreaker on Sunday.

Matched up with No. 70 Dartmouth, the Red and Blue (9-8, 1-3 Ivy) picked up their first Ivy League victory of the season, 4-3.

When the Penn men’s tennis team takes the court this weekend, avoiding the distractions surrounding Fling will not be the Quakers’ biggest challenge.

The story of Wee’s tennis career goes back to his homeland of Singapore and takes quite a few turns.

The Quakers wrapped up their Ivy road trip with a 5-2 loss at Brown, and a 7-0 loss at No. 54 Yale.

After dropping their Ivy League opener to Princeton last weekend, the Quakers will travel to take on Brown on Saturday and No. 54 Yale on Sunday.

Penn (8-6, 0-1 Ivy) came back to win the last three matches over No. 52 Princeton (12-4, 1-0) to move closer, but the Tigers had already clinched the victory.

The men’s tennis team will take the short trip to Princeton on Saturday to take on the Tigers. Coming off its first road win of the season, the culmination of its non-conference schedule, Penn will be entering its first Ivy League match of the spring 2013 season.

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