Fort Wayne, IN — The Mid-Central Conference released its 2007 men’s tennis post-season tournament pairings Tuesday, highlighting this weekend’s three-day event to be held at Fort Wayne Concordia Lutheran High School beginning Thursday morning.
The tournament, which features a flighted format for each of the nine traditional slots (one through six singles, one through three doubles) has Goshen head coach Stan King optimistic, as the Leafs’ leader is hopeful his team can better its sixth-place performance from a year ago (click here for related article). Goshen (4-6, 2-5) enters this weekend’s event tied for sixth with Huntington University following regular-season competition.
“I’m optimistic about our chances of moving up from our MCC finish in the round robin but we’ll have to stay focused and play good tennis,” King said. “The draw for the tournament looks favorable for us, as we secured five seeds in singles and one doubles’ seed.”
With seeding based on players’ records against conference opponents at their respective positions, the top four players — or doubles teams — from each flight were seeded, with their opponents being selected from the remaining four players or teams (unseeded).
“This means that for five of the six singles positions and one of the three doubles positions we have players that are matched in the first round against opponents they defeated earlier in the season,” King said. “In one sense, this is an advantage for us, but at the same time we must realize that for the most part we’ll be up against players who may have extra incentive to defeat us.”
King has three flights seeded third for the event and three earning the fourth seed, as freshmen Sashi Sabanathan (number two singles) and Alex Dominguez (number three singles) both earned the third-best seed in their respective flights. Sabanathan and senior Beakal Girma teamed to capture the three seed in number one doubles competition, while Girma (number one singles), sophomore Joel King (number four singles) and freshman Chanukk Algama (number six singles) all earned four seeds.
Team points are earned per match win at the tournament. Last season Goshen finished with just two points. Stan King is optimistic that number can be vastly improved beginning Thursday.
“Again, we’ve got to play good tennis,” he said. “Everyone is in the same boat here, knowing that it’s now or never. That type of environment often helps some players elevate their games. I’ll be looking for our guys to do the same.”
The first round of doubles play for men begins at 1:00 p.m. Thursday, followed by the first round of singles play. All second round matches begin with doubles on Friday at 1:00 p.m. followed by singles. All championship matches for both men and women are scheduled for Saturday morning beginning at 9:00 a.m. All doubles play involves 8-game pro-sets and singles matches are all two out of three sets.
Pine Ridge Racquet Club — an indoor tennis facility — will again serve as a backup site in the event of rain or unusually cold weather, both distinct possibilities on Thursday.
Goshen’s complete lineup — and seedings — for the MCC Tournament appears below.
Singles:
#1 Beakal Girma seeded 4th vs Marian College unseeded
#2 Sashi Sabanathan seeded 3rd vs Indiana Wesleyan University unseeded
#3 Alex Dominguez seeded 3rd vs Marian College unseeded
#4 Joel King seeded 4th vs Spring Arbor University unseeded
#5 Sheldon Good unseeded vs Indiana Wesleyan University seeded 3rd
#6 Chanuk Algama seeded 4th vs Spring Arbor University unseeded
Doubles:
#1 Beakal Girma/Sashi Sabanathan seeded 3rd vs Grace College
#2 Alex Dominguez/Joel King unseeded vs Spring Arbor University seeded 4th
#3 Sheldon good/Ashe Abebe unseeded vs Indiana Wesleyan University seeded 2nd
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Freshman Chanuk Algama