FAYETTEVILLE, N.C. -- The Methodist men's tennis team kicked off its 2017-18 season by hosting the Methodist Fall Invitational this weekend.
 
The weekend event consisted of seven teams with nine singles flights and five doubles draws. Play began on Friday afternoon and concluded on Sunday evening.
 
In the #2 doubles flight, the team of Reid Rose and Jacob Oehser defeated the tandem of William Driskill and Clark Cummings of Hampden-Sydney, 8-3, to advance to the semifinals of the draw. The duo lost 8-3 to the Barton pairing of Ermanno Galimberti and Alessandro Gerbino, but rebounded by defeating Mason Robb and Elijah Gregory of Guilford, 8-3, to claim third place. Also in the flight, Trent Harner and Hayden Wilfong lost their opening match, 8-3, but claimed wins over Naranjo and Michal Rapsik of Belmont abbey, 8-7, and Driskill/Cummings, 8-3, to win the consolation bracket.
 
The duo of Danny Moore and Ryan Jenne dropped an 8-6 contest to Tate Godwin and Logan Glass of Guilford before defeating two Averett pairings in the consolation bracket to claim a win. The team moved past Henry Blanco and Carlos Lora, 8-5, before defeating Abdugani Ganiev and Simon Levinsson, 8-4.
 
Also in doubles, Owen Findley and KJ Hardie defeated Jarad Gandy and Kane Mills of Guilford, 8-5, to advance to the semifinals of No. 5 doubles, while Daniel Wolf and Justin Tegen also defeated Gandy/Mills in the third place match.
 
In singles action this weekend, R.J. Clement fell to Matt Moody of Hampden-Sydney, 6-3, 6-2, before defeating Nicolas Yanes, 6-1, 6-4, in the consolation semis. Clement moved to the consolation finals and defeated Averett's Caius Blomqvist who was named First Team All-USA South a season ago.
 
Freshman Coleman Baker opened the No. 3 singles draw with a 6-3, 7-5 victory against Cummings before dropping a 6-3, 6-2 contest in the following round. Baker responded by defeating Naranjo of Belmont Abbey, 6-4, 6-1, to claim third place in the bracket. In the same draw, Rose fought back after losing his first match by winning 6-2, 6-2 against Averett's Thomas Woodcock and then won the consolation draw with a 6-4, 6-4 win over Graham Pearson of Guilford.
 
Harner recorded a pair of wins in the fourth singles flight. His first win came in a marathon 4-6, 6-4, 15-13 match against Abdugani Ganiev and then claimed the consolation title by defeating Driskill 7-6, 6-4.
 
In the sixth singles flight, Jack Holloway and Hayden Wilfong each earned a win in the first round before dropping their next matches. The two faced off in the flight's third-place match with Holloway picking up a 4-6, 7-5, 10-6 victory. Max Linder and Danny Moore also claimed wins in the No. 7 singles draw and faced each other in the semifinals of the flight. Moore defeated Linder by a 6-1, 5-7, 10-8 count before dropping his next match.
 
Kayhahn Alikhani defeated Christian Quick of Hampden-Sydney 6-1, 6-1, before picking up his second win of the weekend with a 6-0, 6-2 win against Silvey of Belmont Abbey.
 
Methodist returns to action on Sept. 24 against Guilford before traveling to the ITA Regional Championships in Rome, Ga., on Sept. 29-Oct. 1.
 
 
 
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