NORTHFIELD, SAINT PETER, Minn. - No. 12 Gustavus men's tennis played a couple matches Saturday and earned a pair of convincing wins. The Gusties started the day on the road, defeating St. Olaf 9-0 before returning home and beating Luther 8-1, improving to 7-3 overall and 3-0 in the MIAC. 

Against St. Olaf, the Gusties started the match with a sweep in doubles, highlighted by an 8-0 win at No. 3 by Oscar Wilkstrom and Geoffrey Youngs. Five of the six singles were won in straight sets. Youngs battled for a three-set victory, 6-1, 3-6, 10-8, at the No. 6 spot. 

Against Luther, the Gusties dropped their lone point of the day at No. 1 doubles as Max Loen and Luke Westholder defeated Marco Siviero and Josh Christensen 8-2. Gustavus went on to win the remaining two doubles and swept singles play. Siviero went three sets at No. 1 singles and and defeated Westholder 1-6, 6-2, 6-2. Gage Gohl erased a first set 7-5 loss and won the next two 6-3, 10-5 at No. 4. The other singles were won in straight sets. 

"The guys put together two solid efforts today," Head Coach Tommy Valentini said. "Against St. Olaf, we played strong doubles at one and three, and Rafa and Luke held their nerve at two to get us the sweep and a lot of momentum heading into the singles. Luther came out firing in the doubles and we did well to execute our game plan there to get out to the 2-1 lead. In the singles Marco showed a ton of resilience to hang in there against a very tough opponent to come through in three sets. Overall our singles group showed a lot of poise and competed at a very high level. We'll look to recover from this long and fun day and be ready for another tough challenge next week."

Gustavus plays UW-Whitewater on Friday.

* Luther box score to be posted soon... Read Full Article