Men's Tennis Falls Indoors At Southwest Baptist

Big Rapids, Mich. - For a second consecutive day, the Ferris State University men's tennis squad fell in a battle of nationally-ranked schools as the Bulldogs dropped a 7-2 decision to Southwest Baptist (Mo.) on Thursday (March 11).

The match was originally slated to be held on the Bearcats' home courts, but was moved indoors to the Springfield (Mo.) area due to rain and played at the Cooper Tennis Complex's indoor courts.

Southwest Baptist entered the match ranked 31st in the most recent Intercollegiate Tennis Association (ITA) Division II National Rankings with the Bulldogs listed 44th nationally.

The Bearcats picked up their third win of the season (3-6) by taking five of six singles matches after opening up a 2-1 advantage following the doubles round.

Marton Zsiga won his seventh-straight individual match for Southwest Baptist at the number one singles flight with a 6-4, 6-3 victory over FSU's Kyle Revall. The Bearcats' Domingos Carissimo (#2), Jorge Palacios (#4) and Brandon Finerty (#5) also picked up straight-set wins while number three player Jorge Margiotta rallied for a three-set win.

Zsiga and Margiotta took a close 9-8 win over Revall and Steven Roberts at the top doubles flight with Palacios and Tyler Welch beating Ferris State's Ahmet Demir and Arin Enge by an 8-3 count at third doubles.

FSU's lone singles win was a 7-5, 6-1 victory from freshman Tyler Marengo at the sixth flight.  The Bulldogs' pairing of Jack Swan and Justin Hermes also pulled out an 8-5 victory at the second doubles position for Ferris' other point in the match.

With the loss, the Bulldogs dropped to 3-3 overall this season and have now lost three consecutive matches on their annual spring break trip with two coming to nationally-ranked Division II schools along with a setback at NCAA Division I Missouri-Kansas City.

Ferris State will wrap up its trip by visiting Washburn (Kan.) on Friday (March 12) for a 10 a.m. (EST) non-league tilt in Topeka, Kan.