CAMBRIDGE, Mass. – The Harvard men's tennis team dropped its first Ivy match of the season, falling, 4-3, to Brown Thursday night at the Murr Center tennis courts. Harvard moves to 5-1 in league play and looks to claim the outright Ivy title Saturday at Dartmouth in its final regular-season match of the schedule.

 

Doubles was closely contested with both the first and second courts going to tiebreakers. Nicky Hu and Andy Nguyen on the second court battled back to knot the match at 8-8 to force the tiebreaker, and fended off a handful of match-points to claim the victory 9-8. It was a similar situation on court one where Denis Nguyen and Casey MacMaster did well to hold serve and work the match to a deciding tiebreaker. The duo fought off multiple match points but could not pick up the mini-break late in the match, falling to Michael Riechmann and Daniel Hirschberg. Brown's third duo of Justin To and Lucas Da Silveira rallied from a 6-3 deficit to top Alex Steinroeder and Kelvin Lam, 9-7, securing the doubles point for the Bears.   

 

Alex Steinroeder quickly righted the ship for the hosts, leveling the match score at 1-1 with an impressive, 6-1, 6-2, victory over Hirschberg on the fourth court. Nicky Hu was next up for Harvard, polishing off Brandon Burke in straight sets, 6-4, 7-5, to give Harvard a brief 2-1 lead. Brown came back with another match point at No. 6 where Da Silveira took down Lam, 6-3, 6-4.

 

After dropping the first set, Andy Nguyen rallied for a gutsy 7-5 win in the second. Sam Fife stepped up in the final stanza, however, claiming the 7-5, 5-7, 6-2 win to put the Bears one point from the victory. On the first court, Denis Nguyen breezed to the first set, 6-1, but dropped an extended tiebreaker in the second to push the match to a deciding set. Brown's Michael Riechmann did well to keep the ball in play and rallied for a 1-6, 7-6, 6-3 win to claim the match for Brown.

 

Harvard wraps up its regular season Saturday in Hanover, N.H., when it takes on Dartmouth in a 2 p.m. start.

 

Harvard 3, Brown 4

 

Doubles

1. Riechmann/Hirschberg (B) def. MacMaster/D. Nguyen (H), 9-8

2. A. Nguyen/Hu (H) def. Burke/Fife (B), 9-8

3. To/Da Silveira (B) def. Lam/Steinroeder (H), 9-7

 

Singles

1. Michael Riechmann (B) def. Denis Nguyen (H), 1-6, 7-6, 6-3

2. Shaun Chaudhuri (H) def. William Spector (B), 5-7, 6-4, 2-2 Def.

3. Sam Fife (B) def. Andy Nguyen (H), 7-5, 5-7, 6-2

4. Alex Steinroeder (H) def. Daniel Hirschberg (B), 6-1, 6-2

5. Nicky Hu (H) def. Brandon Burke (B), 6-4, 7-5

6. Lucas Da Silveira (B) def. Kelvin Lam (H), 6-3, 6-4