Griz stay unbeaten with weekend sweep

Saturday, February 15

Walla Walla, Wash.

10 AM (MT)

Montana

Whitman

2/16/2025 6:40:00 PM | Men's Tennis

Box Score 1 Box Score 2

By: Montana Sports Information

The Montana men's tennis team stayed undefeated on the season with a two-match road trip sweep over the weekend. The Griz blanked Whitman 7-0 in Walla Walla on Saturday and followed that up with a 6-1 win over Lewis-Clark State in Lewiston on Sunday to improve to 8-0 in the championship duals season.

Coming off a week that saw the team log one of the biggest road wins in program history over Air Force and net Big Sky Player of the Week honors, the Griz used the matches against D-III Whitman and NAIA LC-State as an opportunity to rest some starters and get reps for everyone on the roster.

UM didn't miss a beat with shuffled lineups and reserves in the lineup, winning both doubles points and 11 of the 12 singles matches in straight sets with only the one loss against the Warriors as the Griz set their sights on Gonzaga next week.

"Winning on the road in college tennis, regardless of the level, is tricky. So, it was beneficial for us to get back out and get more used to winning on the road. That's the purpose of these trips. We got reps for everyone and solidified some doubles teams, it was really good. I thought everybody competed well," said head coach Jason Brown.

Grizzly No. 1 and returning unanimous All-Big Sky pick Tom Bittner stayed undefeated this season with a pair of wins, not giving up more than three games in two convincing straight-set victories to bump his personal singles record to 5-0 on the year.

Freshman Duncan McCall continued to impress in his first season at UM, moving up to court two and winning his sixth-straight singles match 6-1, 6-2, over Whitman's Cameron Yang and 6-4, 6-4 against LCSC's Pablo Herrera.

Eivind Tandberg got back to his winning ways with a second and third-straight win, beating Whitman's Alejandro Raffo 6-1, 6-2 and LCSC's Gautam Balakrishnan 6-3, 6-3 on courts five and four, respectively, to hold down the bottom of the lineup.

Jake Watkins, who came out on the winning end of a battle with cancer as a freshman, also earned two wins, defeating the Blues' Thomas Braeden 6-3, 6-1 and the Warrior's Cesar Coloma 6-4, 6-3.

The Griz now prepare to chase another upset as they head to Spokane on Feb. 23 to take on the Bulldogs at GU's Stevens Tennis Center before opening Big Sky play at Sacramento State in early March.

"The whole goal is that we peak at the end of April, and I know that we're infinitely better now than we were a month ago. If we continue to progress in this way, we're going to have a really great season," said Brown.

"Any time we compete it shows us where we need to get better, but we're improving, that's the most important thing. We're improving, the guys are competing hard, and we're going to keep on that trajectory, head to Gonzaga next weekend and see if we can really give them a fight."