Steven Chen ’18 led the men’s tennis team with a historic runner-up performance at the annual fall ITA New England regional champion- ship in Middlebury this past Saturday. Teammates Michael Liu ’17, Jake Roberts ’17, and Sam Rudovsky ’16 all reached the semifinals in their respec- tive brackets.
Chen went 5-1 on his way to the finals of the 64-man singles tour- nament, becoming the first Wesleyan men’s tennis player to reach the fi- nals since Tom Reifenheiser ’94. Reifenheiser will be inducted into Wesleyan’s Athletics Hall of Fame in the coming weeks.
“I knew going into the tourna- ment that Steven was going to have the chance to make a pretty deep run,” said Head Coach Mike Fried. “He really demonstrated to everyone what I’ve kind of known for the past several weeks or longer, which is that he is clearly one of the best freshmen in the country. He’s someone who can play any class year on any team in the country.”
Chen’s path to the finals wasn’t especially easy, as the first-year faced a 3-0 deficit in the first set of his second- round match. However, Chen man- aged to come back and win the set 7-5 before cruising to a victorious 6-1 second set. The righty continued his dominant play, winning his quarterfi- nal and semifinal matches by a com- bined score of 24-6.
“At the beginning I was a little tight, mostly because it was my first
serious match, but I started to loosen up and play my game,” Chen said. “I don’t know what clicked, but some- thing happened and I was able to put a run together. I think it just took some getting comfortable.”
Normally, the winner of each ITA regional championship advances to the national tournament in mid-October in South Carolina. However, it is un- known whether the winner of this past week’s tournament, Amherst’s Michael Solimano, will be able to compete then, so it is possible that Chen could get the nod as the runner-up.
“His game is incredibly solid and extremely balanced,” Fried said. “Both his ability to be versatile on the court, to have weapons pretty much every- where, and to be unbelievably reliable from everywhere on the court.”
This weekend’s performance marks another strong showing this fall for the Cardinals, who went un- defeated in a doubles tournament at Fairfield earlier in September. Liu and Roberts, the top two singles players for the Cards last spring, both com- peted in the singles tournament this past weekend, and Roberts was joined by Rudovsky in the doubles tourna- ment. The trio of Liu, Roberts, and Rudovsky went a combined 8-3 on Saturday.
“Our team is extra supportive of each other,” Chen said. “This event really helped us bond a lot more, es- pecially compared to other teams who aren’t as close because they’re so big and have everyone competing against each other for playing time. We’re smaller so it’s easier, but we’re really close.”
Greg Lyon ’17 and Win Smith
’18 teamed up as the second doubles squad, but fell 8-4 in the first round. Dhruv Yadav ’18 filled the final singles spot for the Cards, losing in his first round match.
Each ITA regional championship gives the involved schools a predeter- mined number of slots, depending on the success and ranking of their program. Wesleyan has not had a tra- ditionally powerful tennis program, but its recent success helped the Cards receive more spots in this year’s event.
“If I had to guess, I would have thought we would get maybe three singles and two doubles [spots], so it was definitely a pleasant surprise to get four and two,” Fried said. “I think we justified those selections incredibly well, between Steven in the finals and Mike Liu in the semis.”
Fried also noted that he saw a higher level of play from Roberts and Rudovsky in their doubles match this weekend compared to last year. While the duo of Roberts and Rudovsky was the strongest doubles pair for the Cardinals a year ago, the team strug- gled last spring (with a 21-23 record), and improvement in doubles this spring will be necessary to compete for a NESCAC championship.
The Cards will wrap up their fall season next weekend with a weekend-long invitational tourna- ment at Quinnipiac University. University of Connecticut, University of Hartford, Villanova University, Wagner College, Fairleigh-Dickinson University, Fordham University, and host Quinnipiac are all scheduled to compete, making the Cardinals the lone Division III team in the invitational.