A dominating 7-0 victory Friday afternoon over Eastern Illinois kicked off a successful weekend for the Marquette men's tennis team.
The Golden Eagles, which also defeated Southern Illinois 6-1 Saturday, rebounded from a lopsided defeat at the hands of Western Michigan Jan. 29 at the Helfaer Tennis Stadium.
"We just competed a lot harder in the last two matches," said freshman Brett Binkley.
Marquette head coach Steve Rodecap used the match against Eastern Illinois to get some of his players more playing time.
Sophomore Tomek Czernuszewicz and freshman Greg Sirotek won their spring debut, 8-6, at No. 3 doubles over Sean Bush and Eric Stuertz, while junior Ricky Servoss easily defeated Kevin Arndt 6-1, 6-1, in his first singles match of the spring.
Junior Ian Kawas won a physically draining two-set match against Eastern Illinois's Brandon Lenfert 6-2, 7-6. Kawas and Lenfert went back and forth in a punishing second set.
Kawas' serve helped carry him in both matches. He pulled away from Southern Illinois' Sergio Sanchezmatthewn in the second set of his 6-4, 6-2 victory.
"I started taking a lot more control of the points," Kawas said of his performance in the second set.
Junior Eigis Vedrickas clawed his way to a 7-6 (7-4), 3-6, 10-7 victory over Alex Nomicos of Southern Illinois in the No. 1 singles match Saturday. Vedrickas rallied from a 1-4 deficit to win the 10-point tiebreaker at the end of the match.
He also beat Eastern Illinois' Charles LeVaque 6-3, 6-2.
Marquette's three freshmen — Pete Van Lieshout, Binkley and Sirotek — each won their singles matches in straight sets.
Good doubles play by Marquette set the pace for each match.
Senior Troy Delmege and Vedrickas brushed aside LeVaque and Ryan Blankenbaker of Eastern Illinois in an 8-4 victory.
They also defeated Southern Illinois' Bojan Ilievski and Lukasz Soswa, 8-5. Ilievski effectively broke his own serve twice by double-faulting on break points, giving Delmege and Vedrickas the breathing room they needed to pull off the win.
Binkley and Van Lieshout beat Lenfert and Chris Thomas, 8-6, in a tightly contested match. They also downed Lama and Julian Botero of Southern Illinois, 8-5.
Marquette's usual No. 3 doubles team, Kawas and Servoss, returned against Southern Illinois with an 8-5 win over Nomicos and Tomas Gonzalez.
Delmege, who sat out against Eastern Illinois Friday, lost to Southern Illinois' Rodrigo Lama, 4-6, 6-7. Delmege's defeat was Marquette's only loss of the weekend.
This article appeared in The Marquette Tribune on Feb. 8 2005.