SAULT STE. MARIE, Mich. - The Lake Superior State (LSSU) men's tennis team (7-3, 2-1 GLIAC) earned a pair of key victories over the weekend against No. 29 Purdue Northwest (PNW) (13-5) and Roosevelt (RU) (8-11).
 

No. 29 Purdue Northwest Pride

The Lakers got off to a hot start in doubles play as the duo of Driss Sedrati (Casablanca, Morocco) and Raul Velasco Garcia (Barcelona, Spain) quickly asserted themselves with a 6-2 win in the top doubles match against the 29th ranked doubles team in the nation in PNW's Alex Van Lumich and Samuel Dickson. LSSU would then go on to sweep the remaining doubles matches with the pairing of Stefan Andrei (Gelati, Romania) and Jordi Fraile Raton (Sant Cugat, Spain) securing a 6-3 victory in the No. 2 doubles match while the team of Maxence Hamon (Montreal, Que.) and Haitam Aboufirassi (Montreal, Que.) earned a 6-3 win of their own at the No. 3 spot.

In singles play, both Sedrati and Velasco recorded a 6-3, 6-4 win at the No. 2 and No. 4 spots, respectively, to push the Pride to the brink, and Andrei would then secure the match for his team with a 6-4, 6-3 victory at the top of the lineup over Van Lumich who entered the day as the 40th ranked singles player in the country. Fraile was able to tack on one more victory on the day for LSSU after grinding out a 7-5, 6-3 win in the No. 3 singles match as the Lakers came away with the 5-2 victory as a team in their home-opener. 
 

Roosevelt Lakers

LSSU would once again strike quickly in doubles as the duos of Andrei/Fraile and Sedrati/Velasco blitzed their opponents for respective wins of 6-1 and 6-2 to quickly secure the doubles point for their team. Hamon and Aboufirassi would find themselves in a tight battle in the No. 3 doubles match that would need a tiebreaker to resolve it. In the tiebreaker, after finding themselves trailing 3-2, Hamon and Aboufirassi were able to lock in and rattle off five straight points to secure the doubles sweep. 

Velasco was able to secure the first singles win of the day for the Lakers with a 6-1, 6-2 victory at the No. 4 spot, and Sedrati would finish off his match a few moments later with a 6-1, 6-1 win at the No. 2 position. Fraile would then clinch the match for his team with a score of 6-0, 6-3 in the No. 3 singles match to give LSSU their second team victory in as many days. Andrei continued LSSU's winning ways with a 6-2, 6-2 result at the top of the lineup, and Lezan Koyuncu (Cologne, Germany) extended the team score to 6-0 after cruising to a 6-2, 6-0 victory at the No. 5 spot. RU did manage to narrowly avoid being swept across the board by claiming a win in the No. 6 singles match, but not without having to hold off a valiant effort from Aboufirassi who took the second set by a score of 6-4 before ultimately falling in a super-tiebreaker by a margin of only three points.

LSSU will now turn their attention to a matchup against the Wayne State Warriors on Friday, April 4 with the first serve scheduled for 10 a.m.