Men's Tennis Opens Fall Season at Fab-4 Invite

Friday, September 16

Cary, N.C.

All Day

Duke University

Day One at Duke Fab-4 Invitational

Duke Prepares For Georgia in NCAA Round of 16

Men's Tennis Opens Fall Season at Fab-4 Invite

9/16/2011 8:44:00 PM | Men's Tennis

By: Duke Sports Information

CARY, N.C. - After day one of the Duke Fab-4 Invitational, the Duke men's tennis team opened their fall season during a cool day with cloudy skies. Despite the unkindly weather that moved the final few men's matches to the University of North Carolina's courts, the Blue Devils played their way through and notched excellent victories on the singles and doubles fronts.

In the blue bracket for singles play, No. 4 ranked Henrique Cunha cruised to a 6-3, 6-2 victory over Elon's Cameron Silverman. Luke Marchese also won, defeating William & Mary's Charlie Ghriskey 6-4, 6-1, but Cale Hammond fell 6-4, 7-6 at the hands of South Carolina's Nick Jones. On Saturday in the quarterfinals, Cunha will take on N.C. State's Robbie Mudge and Marchese will face North Carolina's Joey Burkhardt. Hammond will meet N.C. State's Sean Weber in a consolation semifinals match up.

In the black bracket, top-seeded Chris Mengel upended William & Mary's Ben Hoogland 7-5, 6-0, while Jason Tahir defeated Kentucky's Maks Gold 6-2, 6-2. Torsten Wietoska also advanced after defeating Elon's Carlos Arboleda 6-3, 7-5. In tomorrow's quarterfinal action, Mengel will take on N.C. State's Ivan Sanchez, Tahir will face Louisville's Andrew Carter and Wietoska will match up with Radford's Stijn Meulemans.

In the white bracket, Duke's Raphael Hemmeler topped Alabama's Michael Thompson 6-3, 6-1 and Fred Saba downed Louisville's Albert Wagner 6-2, 6-3 to advance to Saturday's quarterfinals. Hemmeler will meet N.C. State's Austin Powell and Saba will face South Carolina's Carlos Eguez.

In doubles play, Duke saw quite a bit of success. In the Group A bracket, the duo of Mengel and Cunha defeated Louisville's Robert Hall and Albert Wagner 8-5 before falling in the semifinals in a hard fought 9-8 decision won by Virginia Tech's Luka Somen and Corrado Tocci. On Saturday, Mengel and Cunha will take on Kentucky's Anthony Rossi and Panav Jha in the thirdplace match.

In the Group B1 bracket, Hammond and Tahir lost their first round match to Elon's Cameron Silverman and Eric Turner and then dropped a consolation semifinals match to William Parker and Cameron Ahari of North Carolina. On Saturday, Hammond and Tahir will go up against South Carolina's Carl Eguez and Andrew Adams in the third place match.

In the Group B2 bracket, Saba and Hemmeler had a very successful first day. After advancing to the semifinals in a walkover victory against Alabama, the duo defeated Kentucky's Maks Gold and Grant Roberts to advance to tomorrow's doubles final against Louisville's Sebastian Stiefelmeyer and Andrew Carter.

Also in the Group B2 bracket, Marchese and Wietoska dropped an opening round match, but rebounded with a semifinal consolation bracket victory over N.C. State's Matt Thomson and Sean Weber. Marchese and Wietoska will battle Radford's Stijn Meulemans and Patrick O'Keefe in the consolation bracket championship on Saturday.

All third place and championship matches in doubles play will begin Saturday, Sept. 17 at 9 a.m., at the Cary Tennis Park. Quarterfinal and semifinal singles matches are scheduled for 10 a.m. and 1 p.m., starts, respectively.

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