April 15, 2014
UNIVERSITY PARK, Pa. - The Penn State men's tennis team dropped six spots to No. 22 in this week's ITA Poll, released Tuesday, but remained in the Top 25 for a fourth straight week. The Nittany Lions are 19-4 overall and 6-3 in the Big Ten.
Sophomore Leonard Stakhovsky (Kiev, Ukraine) stayed at No. 33 in the ITA Singles Poll. Stakhovsky and Russell Bader (Austin, Texas) dropped three spots to No. 36 in the ITA Doubles Poll.
The Nittany Lions will look to get back on track this weekend after falling 6-1 against No. 28 Purdue on Friday and 4-2 against No. 59 Indiana on Sunday.
This weekend, they host No. 63 Nebraska on Friday at 3 p.m. and Iowa on Sunday at Noon.
Penn State currently sits in fourth place in the Big Ten standings. No. 1 Ohio State is in first place with a 9-0 mark in conference while Purdue and No. 10 Illinois are tied for second with 7-2 records.
The Nittany Lions are tied for a program-record 19 wins, set in 1984. They also have nine wins against ranked opponents. Penn State is 13-0 at home this spring.
Stakhovsky defeated Purdue's Szymon Tatarczyk last Friday to improve to 16-4 at the top singles spot. He is 5-3 in Big Ten play, with three of those wins coming against ranked opponents. He has an overall record of 6-3 against ranked opponents.
Bader and Stakhovsky split their doubles matches this weekend. On Friday, they fell 8-5 against Purdue's Tatarczyk and Ricky Medinilla, ranked 74th in the doubles poll. However, they bounced back on Sunday with an 8-2 win against Indiana's 65th- ranked doubles team, Daniel Bednarczyk and Sam Monette. The Penn State duo is now 14-5 in dual matches with three wins against ranked foes.
Bader, with 77 career wins, is now one behind Michael James (2010-13) for second on the all-time doubles wins list at Penn State.
The Nittany Lions doubles pair at No. 2, Michael Reilly (Raleigh, N.C.) and Chris Young (Melbourne, Australia) dropped out of the ITA Poll this week. They are 12-2 this spring.
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