April 17, 2011 - The Cougar men's tennis team hosted Concordia University Wisconsin and Lakeland College in the makeup of two Northern Athletics Conference matches postponed from yesterday. The Cougars maintained a winning record in NAC play at 3-2 with a split. losing 9-0 to CUW and beating Lakeland 9-0.

 

In the Concordia Wisconsin match, the most exciting battle came in third doubles. Tim Staffeld

(Hobart, IN/H.S.) and John Gehm (Frankenmuth, MI/H.S.) came up on the short end of an 8-6 score against Taylor Shaffer abd Nathan Hoeppner.

 

In singles play, two of the matches went to third-set tiebreakers. Russell Johnson defeated Alex Tarullo (Berwyn, IL/Morton West H.S.) at third 2-6, 6-3 and 10-3. At fifth, Shaffer edged Staffeld 6-2, 4-6 and 10-5.

 

The afternoon match against Lakeland was all Concordia from the start. The Cougars swept through doubles by scores of 8-3 at first, and 8-2 at both second and third.

 

Jeff Smith (Moline, IL/home schooled) won his match at first singles, 6-3 and 6-1 over Tom Kuehl. Nathan Wingfield (Greendale, WI/Martin Luther) at second and Tarullo at third took their matches by identical 6-0, 6-1 scores. Thien Van (Berwyn, IL/Morton West) shut out his fourth singles opponent in straight sets. Staffeld won 6-1 and 6-2 at fifth, and Gehm completed the match victory by 6-1 and 6-0 scores at sixth.

 

The Cougars (3-3 overall) are scheduled to play Judson University in non-conference action Monday afternoon in Elgin.