Binghamton University and Boston University won first-round matches Friday to advance to the semifinals of the America East Men's Tennis Championship at the Connecticut Tennis Center. The third-seeded Bearcats were 4-0 winners over sixth-seeded University of New Hampshire while the fourth-seeded Terriers defeated fifth-seeded University of Vermont, 5-2. Binghamton will play second-seeded Stony Brook University in a semifinal match Saturday at 12 noon. Boston University meets top-seeded University of Hartford in the other semifinal at 3 p.m. The Wildcats and Catamounts meet in the fifth-place match at 9 a.m. The winner of the America East Men's Tennis Championship, which will be decided Sunday, receives an automatic bid to the NCAA Championship. Results
Binghamton earned the doubles point in its match with a trio of 8-2 wins. Akshay Rao and Dmitri Litvak defeated Kevin O'Keefe and Mike Paul; Brad Davidoff and Brad Sherwood defeated Drew Hendrickson and Graham Milliken; and Steve Spencer and Krishna Vallabhaneni defeated Peter Alle and Scott Rosa.
The Bearcats continued the assault in singles with Rao posting a 6-3, 6-0 win over O'Keefe at number one singles, Spencer a 6-0, 6-1 win over Alle at number five singles and Evan Gottlob a 6-0, 6-2 win over Rosa at number six singles. Litvak (6-2, 2-0 over Hendrickson) and Davidoff (6-2, 4-1 over Paul) led in their singles matches which were not finished after the team match had been decided. Milliken was leading Sherwood, 6-2, 2-1 at the time that match was stopped.
Boston University fell behind 1-0 after the doubles, but won each of the first four singles matches in posting the win. Vermont earned the doubles point when Zeljko Knezevic and Dmitri Euger defeated Jason Vinoles and J.P. Debbink, 8-4 at second doubles and David Levin and Matt Spring downed Noel Moossa and Josh Holbrook, 8-5 at third doubles. The Terriers' Geoff Wagner and Adam Seigel defeated Joshua London and Johann Liljengren, 9-7 (7-4) in first doubles.
Wagner defeated Knezevic, 6-2, 6-3 at number one singles while Seigel defeated London, 6-0, 6-3 at number two singles. Holbrook won 6-4, 6-4 over Euger at number three singles and Moosa posted a 6-4, 7-5 (7-4) win over Levin at number four singles. Vinoles was a 6-1, 6-1 winner over Liljengren at number six singles. Spring defeated Debbink, 7-6 (7-3), 6-0 at number five singles to earn the other team point for the Catamounts.
This is the 14th annual America East Men's Tennis Championship. Stony Brook and Binghamton are participating in their first America East Men's Tennis Championship since joining the conference last fall. Of the present six-team membership, Hartford is the most recent team to have won the conference title, last winning in 1995.
The America East Tennis Championship utilizes a format of three doubles matches and six singles matches. Doubles matches are played first using eight-game pro sets with a 12-point tie-break at eight games all. The team winning two or more of the doubles matches receives one point in the team scoring. The doubles matches are followed by the singles matches using a best two-of-three sets format. Each singles match is worth one point. A minimum of four points is required to win the team match.