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October 27, 2006 > Sports > Sports Notebook

Sports Notebook

By Dylan Farmer | Thresher Editorial Staff

Men’s tennis at Texas this weekend

The men’s tennis team had a strong showing last weekend at the ITA South-Central Regional Championships in Fort Worth, Tex. The team was led by senior Ben Harknett and freshman Filip Paroci, who advanced to the doubles semifinals, and junior Filip Zivojinivic, who won the singles consolation bracket.

This weekend, the Owls travel to Austin, Tex., where they will compete in the Texas Invitational, Rice’s last local tournament of the fall season. In two weeks, the team will travel to Columbus, Ohio for the ITA National Indoor Championships before breaking until the spring semester.

In Fort Worth, Harknett and Paroci overwhelmed their first three opponents — their closest margin of victory was 8-4 over the University of Texas’ Evan Bridges and Jonah Kane-West in the Round of 16. They could not continue their drive, however, and dropped a close 8-6 match to Baylor University’s fifth-seeded David Galic and Matt Brown in the semifinals.

Senior Jason Mok and sophomore Christoph Muller also participated in doubles, upsetting Southern Methodist University’s seventh-seeded Federico Murgler and Alex Skrypko before losing in the quarterfinals.

In singles, Zivojinivic lost in straight sets to the University of Louisiana-Lafayette’s Piotr Banas before making his run through the consolation bracket; his biggest victory was a three-set win over 15th-seeded Matt Bain of Texas A&M University.

Muller also advanced in the regular singles bracket, falling to fourth-ranked and first-seeded Lars Poerschke of Baylor University in the Round of 16.

— Dylan Farmer

Golf 6th at Mason

Rudolph Invitational#

Behind a fifth-place finish from sophomore Kaz Hoffman, the golf team finished 6th of 14 teams at the Mason Rudolph Intercollegiate, held Oct. 22-24 in Franklin, Tenn. Rice’s results showed a decided improvement over last year’s finish, when the Owls placed 11th and Hoffman was the highest finisher at 26th place.

This year, the Owls had three golfers in the top 20 — Hoffman, freshman Christopher Brown at 16th and sophomore Kyle Kelley at 20th — marking the best finish for the team so far this season.

For the first two days of competition, Rice remained steady at fourth place, and after day two the squad was only four stokes out of third place and eight strokes behind leading University of Mississippi. However, a final round 296 ultimately doomed the Owls, as they were leapfrogged by Memphis University and the University of Tennessee-Chattanooga to drop two spots. Mississippi remained in first place with a total score of 876, and Vanderbilt University and North Florida University tied for second with 884 apiece. Rice finished 14 strokes off the lead with an 890.

Rice has two more tournaments left on its fall schedule — the Pacific Invitational in Stockton, Calif., which will be held Nov. 6-8, and the Aloha Purdue Intercollegiate in Poipu, Hawaii, scheduled for Nov. 22-23.

— Dylan Farmer

Women’s tennis team competes at regionals

The women’s tennis team advanced four players to the Round of 32 last weekend and one to the Round of 16 at the Southwest Regional Championships in Fort Worth, Tex.

junior Christine Dao, freshman Rebecca Lin, freshman Julie Chao and junior Tiffany Lee all won their first round matches in straight sets, but only Dao made it any further in the main draw, losing to Baylor University’s 14th-ranked Zuzana Cerna 6-0, 6-4 in the Round of 16.

In the Round of 32, Lin dropped a three-set match to Petra Dizdar of the University of Texas 5-7, 6-1, 6-3, while Iva Mihaylova of Baylor beat Chao 6-1, 4-6, 6-4. Lee fell to the 14th-ranked Natalia Bubien of Southern Methodist University in straight sets.

In the consolation bracket, Lin, Chao, and Lee all made the quarterfinal round. Although Lin and Lee lost, Chao won by default, advancing to the semifinals. She lost in a close third-set tiebreaker to Nicki Mechem of Texas A&M, 7-5, 4-6, 15-13.

Rice also advanced three doubles teams to the Round of 32, including Chao and Lee, who made it to the Round of 16. However, the first-to-eight set went to a tiebreak, and they lost 9-8 to Anna Blagodarova and Marisa Druss of Texas A&M University.

The Owls have this week off, but return to action Nov. 3 at the Harvard Invitational in Boston. It will be the team’s last tournament of the fall, and Rice will have two months off before the season resumes with a dual match against Baylor University Jan. 20.

— Burton DeWitt

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