#1 Men's Tennis Defeats #3 Tufts to Advance to National Championship Match

CHATTANOOGA, Tenn. -- The top-ranked University of Chicago men's tennis team battled through four different weather delays to take down #3 Tufts and advance to the third National Championship match in program history.

The Jumbos came out in a fury as the best doubles team in the country claimed the opening point of the match. Tufts took the #3 doubles match 6-2 and the #2 doubles match 6-3 to claim the 1-0 lead.

In singles play, it was a back and forth affair to begin the match.

Alexander Ekstrand won his opening set 6-2, and

Emil Grantcharov and

Ajer Sher also won their opening sets 6-3 and 6-4 to give UChicago momentum. However, the Jumbos claimed the opening sets at both #4 and #6 singles.

Shrikeshav Murugesan took home the win in the first set a #1 singles in a marathon tiebreak, earning the win 7-6(11-9). This momentum would be short lived, however, as the teams had to head to the locker room for the first weather delay. After a two-hour delay, the teams came back to the court before having to be delayed again just before the first serve to restart the matches. The teams would be sent out again later, but they would have to wait once more as rain began to fall. The teams would finally get restarted at approximately 4 PM after a nearly three-hour delay.

Coming out of the delay,

** **Ekstrand claimed the opening point for the Maroons as he entered the delay in the second-set tiebreak. Ekstrand won the tiebreak 7-3 to claim the 6-2, 7-6(7-3) win over the #35 player in Division III at #3 singles. Moments later, the Maroons took the lead in the match as Sher earned a 6-4, 6-4 victory at #5 singles to put UChicago in front 2-1.

Following his tiebreaker win in the opening set, Murugesan held the momentum and earned the breaks of serve in the second set to claim the win at #1 singles, putting UChicago just one win away from victory in the match.

While the rest of the UChicago team claimed victories, the Maroons battled back in the two matches that they dropped the opening sets. After falling 6-1 at #6 singles,

Christian Liew won the second set 6-3 to send his match to a deciding set.

Michael Choi also bounced back from a 6-4 defeat in set number one, winning the second set 6-2. However, as Liew continued to roll, it became a race against the clock. Liew picked up a big break of serve and had a chance to serve for the match at 5-3. After taking a 40-15 lead, rain began to fall, and after a slip by Liew, the match was suspended once more with the Maroons one point from victory.

After another delay that was over an hour in length, the teams returned to the court with two match points at #6. The Jumbos were able to save the first match point, but a powerful serve by Liew was returned wide and the Maroons claimed the 4-1 win over Tufts.

With the win, the Maroons improve to 22-3 overall on the season. UChicago will take on #2 Claremont-Mudd-Scripps on Friday afternoon in a rematch of the 2024 National Championship in St. Louis. UChicago is looking to win their third National Championship in the past five years, and Claremont-Mudd-Scripps will be looking for their first title since 2015 with the Stags holding a record of just 1-10 in the National Championship all-time.