MADISON, N.J. – The TCNJ men's tennis team enjoyed a promising start to the ITA Northeast Regional championship, moving three of five singles entrants and all three doubles teams into the second round of the tournament on a rain-soaked day at Drew University.
 
Forced to move indoors, Friday's action was cut down to one round of singles and doubles (both pro sets) as opposed to the originally scheduled two. That was just fine for the Lions, who progressed much of their contingent on to Saturday.
 
HOW IT HAPPENED

• Derek Jordan was first up for TCNJ and wasted little time booking his advancement with an 8-1 victory over Pratt's Mehul Bhavara in which he reeled off the last six games
• Matthew Michibata followed with a hard-fought 8-5 defeat of Union's Solen Bellemare
• Aayush Kishore made his regionals debut a memorable one, outlasting Vassar's Ethan Mantell, 7-5, in a tiebreaker in which he trailed 3-0
• Alberto Thomas gave 9-16 seed Nika Mori of Skidmore a battle before conceding an 8-6 decision, and Brett Schuster also drew a tough straw with a seeded player from RPI
• Matthew Michibata and Harrison Maitland-Carter, the No. 1 seed in the doubles championship, backed up their top billing with a resounding 8-2 defeat of a pairing from Oneonta
• Kishore and Thomas notched an 8-5 win over a duo from Skidmore, while Schuster joined Asa Wong for an 8-5 win against a Lebanon Valley tandem

NOTES

• Jordan and Kishore registered their first regional singles victories, while Thomas, Schuster, and Wong picked up their first regional wins in doubles
• Michibata got great news before he even took the court, as top seed and two-time reigning regional champion Aidan Drover-Mattinen suffered a shocking upset in the first round. Michibata, seeded 3/4, likely would have met Drover-Mattinen if he advances to the semifinals
• Michibata moved all alone into fifth on TCNJ's all-time list with his 125^th and 126^th career victories. His singles win was the 57^th of his career, moving him into ninth all-time
• The regional championship is used to determine qualification for the ITA Cup, scheduled for Oct. 12-16 in Rome, Georgia. The singles and doubles finalists from each regional championship earn automatic bids to the ITA Cup

UP NEXT

• Singles 2^nd-round matchups: Jordan vs. Anson Anderson (Hamilton), Michibata vs. Adam Warren (Lebanon Valley), Kishore vs. Dimitris Binopoulos (Union)
• Doubles 2^nd-round matchups: Michibata/Maitland-Carter vs. Vennam/Chu (Rochester), Kishore/Thomas vs. Lee/Zheng (NYU), Schuster/Wong vs. Griff/Anderson (Hamilton)