A tough season for the men's tennis team came to an end on the Thursday. The Bulls were eliminated in the first round of the Mid-American Conference Championships by Toledo, cutting their stay by two days.
The sixth seeded Bulls were no match for the third seeded Toledo Rockets, falling 5-1. As a lower seed Buffalo looked to gain momentum early by winning the doubles point. The Buffalo pairing of sophomore Kirill Kolomyts and freshman Marcelo Mazzetto were winning their match when play was halted. Toledo already clinched the doubles point by winning the other two matches. This put Buffalo in a 1-0 hole going into singles play. The Bulls were swept in three doubles matches, and went into singles play down 1-0.
Of the six singles matches that were played, only five were completed, as Toledo swept singles play and clinched the match 5-1. Assistant Coach Nick Zieziula was not surprised with Thursday's results.
"It was reflective of how we preformed all year. It was unfortunate because it was a year where it was very wide open, there wasn't one team that dominated the semi-finals, we didn't take care of the little things to give ourselves the opportunity," Zieziula said.
Competing in the doubles were Sophomore Kirill Kolomyts and freshman Marcelo Mazzetto who ended up 7-6. Junior Octavian Stane, freshman Juan Carlos, junior Alexis Lluis and senior Nikesh Singh Panthlia all ended up with lower results.
The one point Buffalo obtained was from senior Nikesh Sing Panthlia, who won the final singles match of his collegiate career. Playing against Chris Clark, Panthlia won 6-4, 6-3.
Panthlia will be graduating this spring. Zieziula says he will miss the amount of intensity and passion that Panthalia plays with compared to many other players.
Zieziula was dissatisfied in not only this match, but also the entire season, realizing that the team could and should be doing better then they did this season.
"Some years you finish with a bad record but you realize your potential," Zieziula said. "It's definitely not reflective of the amount of talent or what we could have accomplished as a team and that's disappointing."
For next year, Zieziula hopes the team will be more focused. He would like to see the players work harder to change the results of this season, using the poor results as an inspiration to be better next year.
"Hopefully we will return a lot of guys, we are a very young team," Zieziula said. "Hopefully that taste sticks in our freshmen and sophomores mouth and they remember the disappointment that they felt finishing up last season coming out of the tournament so early."
Photo: Courtesy of Laron Fomby
