Four Bison Headed to Richmond's River City Open

Setting the Scene
What: 2024 River City Open, hosted by Richmond
Teams: Bucknell, Richmond, Georgetown, Hampton, Longwood, Virginia, William & Mary, Navy, James Madison, VCU, George Washington
Dates: Friday-Sunday, Oct. 4-6
Where: Westhampton Tennis Complex and Country Club of Virginia

RESULTS

Bucknell at a Glance
• Four Bison will be headed to Richmond this weekend for the River City Open. Sophomores Liam Kilmer and Will Robinson will be joined by freshmen Oumar Diallo and Nelson Alapi. All four will play both singles and doubles, with Robinson/Alapi and Kilmer/Diallo the doubles pairings.
• Bucknell has appeared in two fall tournaments to date. The whole squad competed at the Bucknell Invitational to start the season, and four Bison went to the Carnegie Mellon Invitational in Pittsburgh two weeks ago.
• The Bison have been dominant in both outings thus far, combining for a 36-3 singles record and a 12-6 doubles mark. The team went a perfect 27-0 in singles at the Bucknell Invitational, facing competition from Lafayette, Mount St. Mary's, Saint Francis, and Millersville.
• Freshman Felix Steindl leads the way with a 6-0 singles record, while Alapi, Brendan McDonald, and Shiv Singh are all 5-1. Amar Tahirovic, Oscar Bain Moreno de Vega, Adam Stavrakas, Kilmer, and Diallo are all 3-0.
• Third-year head coach Jason Cohen has an experienced, albeit still youthful roster this season. The 10-man squad features no seniors, but five of the six regular singles players from last season are back, in addition to a promising four-player freshman class.
• Bucknell's lone graduation loss was Tim Zelikovsky, who went 29-3 in singles and 17-11 in doubles last season. Zelikovsky was a stalwart at the bottom of the lineup, playing primarily in the 5 and 6 positions.
• The Bison junior class is loaded, led by returning No. 1 Tahirovic, who went 27-6 in singles and 27-9 in doubles on the way to First Team All-Patriot League honors last year. No. 2 Stavrakas (22-10 singles, 20-16 doubles), No. 3 Bain (24-10 singles, 25-13 doubles), and No. 5 McDonald (11-16 singles, 21-13 doubles) round out the junior class, while No. 4 Kilmer (23-7 singles, 22-10 doubles) is also back after an impressive freshman campaign. Robinson (10-2 singles, 8-7 doubles) was outstanding in a fill-in role last season as well. Robinson was limited to one doubles match last week after sustaining an injury.
• Bucknell is coming off an outstanding spring campaign. The Bison went 16-7 in dual matches, producing the second-most wins in a season in team history, including a 4-2 mark in Patriot League play. Bucknell dropped a tight 4-2 decision to Navy in the Patriot League Tournament semifinals, marking the second straight year that the team fell a few points short of a berth in the final.

A Look Ahead
• Up next are two ITA tournaments later this month. Bucknell is playing in the ITA Northeast Regional this fall after several seasons in the Atlantic Region. This year's Northeast Regional will be in Philadelphia Oct. 17-20. New to the tournament lineup this year is a Patriot League ITA qualifier, which will be held at West Point Oct. 25-27.

Next Event

Players Mentioned

Nelson Alapi

Oscar Bain Moreno de Vega

Liam Kilmer

Brendan McDonald

Will Robinson

Shiv Singh

Adam Stavrakas

Felix Steindl

Amar Tahirovic

Tim Zelikovsky