Indiana men’s tennis continued its fall individual season Oct. 9-13 at the Intercollegiate Tennis Association DI Men's Ohio Valley Regional Championships the past week. Nine Hoosiers competed in the event at Purdue, with senior Sam Landau advancing the furthest.
Landau won five consecutive matches to win the singles co-championship with Vanderbilt University sophomore Pablo Martinez Gomez. The No. 3-seeded Landau defeated Purdue junior Henrik Villanger 7-5, 7-6(3) in the semifinals. With the win, Landau qualified for the NCAA Singles Championships.
He has never qualified for the championships in his four-year collegiate tennis career. Indiana saw then-redshirt sophomore Facundo Yunis and then-junior Jip van Assendelft reach the Sweet 16 of the NCAA Doubles Championships last year.
Landau opened the tournament with a Round of 64 win over University of Tennessee at Chattanooga sophomore Julian Franzmann 6-4, 6-4. Landau only had one three-set matchup during the tournament. In the Round of 32, Purdue sophomore Maj Premzl pushed Landau to a 6-3, 4-6, 6-3 win.
The Hoosier then defeated University of Dayton junior Kyle McNally 6-3, 6-2 in the Round of 16 before winning against East Tennessee State University junior Oscar Martinez 6-2, 6-2.
Along with Landau, sophomore Karan Raghavendra, senior Deacon Thomas, redshirt freshman Aidan Atwood, senior Sam Scherer, sophomore Matteo Antonescu, sophomore Braeden Gelletich, junior Ben Pomeranets, now-redshirt junior Yunis and graduate student Michael Andre competed in the tournament.
Yunis and Andre advanced the furthest after Landau. Both were knocked out of the tournament in the Round of 16. Yunis lost to University of Louisville junior Walid Ahouda 6(4)-7, 2-6, while Andre was defeated 3-6, 6-3, 3-6 by Villanger.
Pomeranets, Thomas and Antonescu were the three other Indiana players who made the Main Draw of the tournament. The No. 14-seeded Pomeranets defeated Eastern Kentucky University senior Adrian Contreras 6-2, 3-6, 6-4 in the Round of 64 before losing to Dayton junior Mikkel Zinder 0-6, 3-6 in the Round of 32.
Thomas won in the two qualifying rounds before withdrawing from a Round of 64 match with an injury. Middle Tennessee State University senior Jonasz Dziopak was winning the first set 3-0 before he withdrew.
Antonescu defeated Louisville junior Russell Lokko 5-7, 7-6(2), 10-2, and Ball State University junior Andrew Hayward 7-5, 5-7, 10-2 in the qualifiers. However, a Round of 64 matchup against the No. 15-seeded Louisville senior Andre Steinbach did not go his way in a 1-6, 4-6 loss.
Raghavendra, Atwood, Gelletich and Scherer all lost in the first round of the qualifier. Raghavendra lost to Bellarmine University freshman Sebastian Baumann 6(11)-7, 6-3, 5-10. Atwood was defeated by Vanderbilt freshman Donghyun Hwang 2-6, 3-6. Gelletich lost to Franzmann 5-7, 6-1, 4-10, while Scherer was defeated by Belmont University freshman Austin Yack 6-4, 6(3)-7, 5-10.
Indiana also found success in doubles during the tournament, with Antonescu and Michael Andre making the semifinals before a loss to Purdue’s No. 6-seeded duo of Premzl and senior Aleksa Krivokapic 4-6, 4-6.
Scherer and Pomeranets had the next-furthest run in the tournament. With the first four rounds only being one-set matches, the winner advanced after securing eight games.
The No. 14-seeded Scherer and Pomeranets advanced past the Eastern Kentucky double of junior Pepe Miralles and junior Romeo Elfving Navarro 8-7(1) before defeating the Bellarmine duo of seniors Mathew Nice and Vineet Ramesh 8-6 in the Round of 32. The Hoosiers’ tournament ended in the Round of 16, falling to Vanderbilt freshman Jack Satterfield and junior Hugo Coquelin 3-8.
The other three doubles pairings for Indiana were all defeated in the Round of 32. Atwood and Gelletich also lost to Premzl and Krivokapic, 3-8. The fifth-seeded double of Yunis and Landau received a bye in the Round of 64 before losing 2-8 to the Dayton duo of McNally and sophomore Dylan Jaen. Due to Thomas’s injury, he and Raghavendra withdrew from the tournament after an 8-7(5) Round of 64 win over the Ball State double of Andrew Hayward and freshman Nolan Hayward.
Indiana men’s tennis will turn its attention to the Big Ten Individual Championships in Madison, Wisconsin, from Oct. 30 to Nov. 2. Landau now competes in the NCAA Singles Championships from Nov. 18-23 in Orlando, Florida.
