Men's Tennis Falls to Little East Foe UMass Boston, 7-2

BRIDGEWATER, Mass. -- The Bridgewater State University men's tennis team dropped a 7-2 decision to Little East Conference (LEC) rival UMass Boston on Saturday afternoon at the Rosen Memorial Tennis Courts.

The visiting Beacons improve to 3-7 on the season and 2-1 in the Little East, while the host Bears slip to 0-6 overall and 0-2 in conference play.

UMass captured two of three doubles matches and five of the six singles flights to come away with the conference win.

Freshman Zachary Mutti (Peabody, Mass.) paced Bridgewater State with a 6-1, 6-3 straight set victory at number five singles. Mutti also teamed with junior Andrew Narciso (East Bridgewater, Mass.) for an 8-6 win at third doubles. Narciso lost a tough three-set match at sixth singles to UMass senior Vlad Leopard (Carnikava, Latvia). Leopard battled back after dropping the first set in a tie-breaker, 7-6 (8-6), to win the next two sets, 6-3, 7-5.

Senior Charles Lai (Boston, Mass.), freshman Austin DeLasse (Shrewsbury, Mass.), junior Greg Fleming (Harwich Port, Mass.) and sophomore Jack Wang (Suzhou, China) also posted singles victories for the Beacons at the first through fourth flights, respectively.  Fleming rebounded from a first set loss to BSU sophomore Justin Haley (South Yarmouth, Mass.) to earn to 1-6, 6-2, 6-4 three-set win at the third spot.

Lai and DeLasse teamed up for an 8-4 decision at first double, while Fleming and Wang edged BSU's second doubles tandem of Haley and junior Jacob Frazee (Yarmouth, Mass.), 9-7.

Both teams are back in action on Tuesday afternoon at 3:30. The Bears entertain LEC rival UMass Dartmouth, while the Beacons travel to Eastern Connecticut State University.