Men's Tennis | 5/2/2021 9:14:00 PM

UTICA, N.Y. – The St. John Fisher College men's tennis team grabbed a regular season-concluding win over Utica College on Sunday afternoon by the slimmest of margins, 5-4, as the team will head into the Empire 8 Conference tournament on a two-game winning streak. With the victory, the Cardinals improved to 4-5 this year and an even 4-4 in the conference, while the Pioneers fell to 1-8 overall.
 
After taking a 6-8 loss in first doubles, the second doubles pairing of Jordan O'Connell and Jon Sutherland took an 8-2 win, while Andrew Cegielski and Anthony Molosag of third doubles teamed up for a straight-sets sweep to put the Cardinals up 2-1 as they headed into singles action.
 
Although Sean Danahy and O'Connell both forced a tiebreaker in each of their individual matches, the Pioneers fought back to take a 4-2 lead in singles play. However, the following three singles matches would seal the Cardinals' fate. Molosag fell behind in his fourth singles appearance, 1-6, but stormed back to take the victory with 6-3 and 6-0 wins. Later, Cegielski and Sutherland combined to win 24 sets in their matches to their opponents' three sets, earning Fisher the come-from-behind 5-4 victory on the day.
 
Linda Gohagan's Cardinals will now prepare for their appearance in this upcoming weekend's Empire 8 tournament, where they will don the Championship's third seed and travel to face the No. 2 Nazareth College Golden Flyers on Friday, May 7.