JACKSON – With one man down due to illness, it looked bleak for the Millsaps Men's Tennis Team as they fell behind 4-0 after doubles matches completed. However, thanks to senior leadership on their Senior Day from Beau Hinton and David Bastian, Millsaps an incredible comeback as they took all five singles matches from the Meridian Community College Eagles to take a 5-4 win to improve their winning streak to five games.
“To go down 4-0 and win five straight matches is huge,” said Head Coach Jason Box. “You can't say enough about how hard these guys compete.”
Meridian jumped all over the Majors, taking the first two doubles matches 8-2 and 8-2 and jumping out to a 4-0 lead due an illness to junior Adam Tilly. The only chance the Majors had was to win every single one of their singles matches.
Junior Malte Schick got things rolling at No. 1 singles with a 6-1, 6-0 performance to get Millsaps on the board as sophomore Misa Pjevac was close behind with a 6-2, 6-0 win at No. 4 singles.
They were not done there as the senior Bastian played a terrific match as he swept his opponent 6-2, 6-3 at No. 2 singles followed by a 6-4, 6-3 win for Charles Rees at No. 3 singles.
It all fell on Hinton as he was going toe-to-toe at No. 5 singles with his opponent Trey Webb. Hinton took set one 6-2, but was in a real battle with Webb as each opponent hit shot after shot as neither man wanted to lose the match. The second set went to a tiebreak where Hinton came through in the clutch as he won 7-4 in the tiebreak to take the match and give Millsaps the win 5-4.
“It felt incredible,” described Bastian on the match. “It was a great effort from everyone and the fact it was Senior Day was a nice tough to one of the best comebacks I've ever been a part of.”
“I'm really excited for our seniors,” added Box. “David and Beau have done excellent things for our program and have been true leaders for us this year which really showed today with Beau finishing it off and David playing one of his best matches of the year.”
Millsaps goes to 9-8 on the season and is really playing well at the right time, as they are one a five game winning streak. They return to action tomorrow afternoon as they play in a huge match against Oglethorpe in Birmingham as this match could decide seeding in the SCAC Tournament. First serve is set for 2 p.m.
Millsaps 5 Meridian CC 4
No. 1 Doubles; Simon Badell and Trey Webb(MCC) d. Charles Rees and Davis Bastian (M); 8-2
No. 2 Doubles; Andrew Nevaz and Zach Marroy (MCC) d. Malte Schick and Misa Pjevac(M); 8-3
No. 3 Doubles; DNP (Tilly: illness)
No. 1 Singles; Schick (M) d. Nevez (MCC); 6-1, 6-0
No. 2 Singles; Bastian (M) d. Marroy (MCC); 6-2, 6-3
No. 3 Singles; Rees (M) d. Huntingdon (MCC); 6-4, 6-3
No. 4 Singles; Pjevac (M) d. Troutman (MCC); 6-2, 6-0
No. 5 Singles; Hinton (M) d. Webb (MCC); 6-2, 7-6 (7-4)
No. 6 Singles; DNP (Tilly: illness)
