The Brandeis men’s tennis team traveled up to Maine for the weekend for the Bates College James Wallach Invitational. For the second straight year a Brandeis tandem took home the A doubles flight trophy. This year the victorious combo was Tyler Ng ’19 and Jeff Chen ’22.
The senior-first year combo defeated an Amherst duo in the first round, 8-6. In the second match of the day the Judges were able to hold off host Bates, winning the match 8-7 in the quarterfinals on Saturday to advance to Sunday’s semifinal round.
The Brandeis duo came to play on Sunday, showing out and stunning the ITA Regional Champions from Bowdoin, taking the match 8-6 to reach the finals. Ng and Chen fell to the Bowdoin doubles team in the ITA Regional tournament just two weeks ago.
In the championship round, they defeated another Amherst team, 8-5, to claim the title for the second year in a row. Last year, in the 2017-18 season, it was David Aizenberg ’20 (abroad for the fall season) and Anupreeth Coramutla ’21 who took home the Wallach A doubles title.
Another Brandeis duo, Rajan Vohra ’21 and Nikhil Das ’21 reached the second round of the tournament with an 8-3 victory over a duo from Wheaton. The sophomore doubles team then fell in the quarterfinals to Amherst, 8-1.
On the singles side of the tournament, Chen supplemented his strong doubles showing with an impressive run in singles. He led the Judges with the top singles performance, reaching the semifinals of the B flight. After earning a bye, Chen defeated a player from Trinity in the second round, 6-3 and 6-2. He then knocked off a Bowdoin player in the quarterfinals, taking the match 7-6 (7-1), 6-2 to reach the semis. He pushed eventual champion Zach Bessette of Amherst to the brink with an impressive performance before falling in a third set, super tiebreaker, 4-6, 7-6 (8-6), 10-6.
Das and Coramutla represented Brandeis in the A singles flight, each winning a match against tough competition. Das defeated a player from host team Bates in a close three-setter, 3-6, 6-2, 10-3, before falling to the eventual champion Scott Altmeyer of Colby, 6-2, 6-2. Coramutla defeated a Colby player in the first round, again in three sets, 3-6, 6-1, 10-3, but then fell to an Amherst player who would eventually make the finals of the A flight, 6-1, 6-1.
Also in the B flight of the tournament, Vohra knocked off a Wheaton player winning the match, 6-4, 6-4, before falling to an Amherst player in three sets, 4-6, 6-3, 10-4.
In C flight play, Ng defeated a player from Trinity, 6-0, 6-3, but fell in the quarterfinals in three sets, 4-6, 6-3, 10-7.
Lastly, In D flight action, Benjamin Wolfe ’20 and Ben Maffa ’21 each won a first round match. Wolfe beat a Trinity player, 6-3, 6-0, while Maffa took down a Skidmore player, 6-3, 7-6 (7-4).
The Judges are back in action this upcoming weekend at home for the Brandeis-Tufts Invitational to wrap up their fall schedule. The A flight of the tournament will be played at Tufts, while the B flight will be played on Brandeis’s home courts. They’ll compete against strong northeastern competition.
