Box Score Orangeburg, NY  |  The College of Staten Island Men's Tennis team returned to action after a twenty-day layoff when they faced fellow East Coast Conference member St. Thomas Aquinas College earlier today.  In their first-ever meeting with the Spartans, the Dolphins won the first of three doubles sets that combined to account for one point, but STAC took the next two along with all six singles matchups to win 7-0.

It was the team of freshmen Marcos Diaz and Niklas Koehne that made a strong impression early when they earned CSI the victory in the first set of doubles play by a score of 6-4.  However, the Spartans took the next two sets, each featuring an additional unique pairing of players from both sides, by scores of 6-1 and 6-0.  These three sets accounted for one of the match's seven points with the others all being earned through singles play.
 
Once again Diaz was involved in a strong push to earn CSI their first point of the match in singles play, and he narrowly missed earning them their second set victory of the match as well.  In his matchup with Roberto Chong of the Spartans out of the No. 1 position, he dropped the first set 6-1 and was outlasted in the second set 7-6.  Ivi Selenica won a pair of games in two sets of singles play out of the No. 3 spot and Mark Karpovas took two games in the second set of his match out of the No. 4 spot, but this was as close as any other Dolphin would get to a set victory.  The result was a 7-0 Spartans victory in the first of what will ultimately be many meetings between the two conference rivals.

The Dolphins will once again be in search of their first win in program history against an opponent when they take on the Maccabees of Yeshiva University one week from tomorrow on Sunday March 8^th at 2 PM.