Men's Tennis Pays Visit to Rider on Saturday Evening

Bucknell (2-1) at Rider (2-6)
When: Saturday, Feb. 10, 1 p.m.
Where: Lawrenceville, N.J.

NOTE: Saturday's match is now scheduled to be played outdoors on the Rider campus at 1 p.m.

Bucknell at a Glance

The Bucknell men's tennis squad is back on the road on Saturday to face Rider at the Hopewell Valley Golf & Country Club. The Bison are 2-1 this spring with wins over Saint Francis and Siena and a loss to NJIT.
Last weekend at Binghamton, the Bison fell 5-2 to an NJIT squad that won 15 matches last season and is off to a 4-0 start this spring. Bucknell won the doubles point and received a win at No. 6 singles from Tim Zelikovsky.
The Bison bounced back a day later to defeat Siena by a 6-1 count. They again captured the doubles point for the third straight time this season, and then chalked up singles wins from Amar Tahirovic, Oscar Bain Moreno de Vega, Liam Kilmer, Zelikovsky, and Will Robinson. Four of the five singles wins were in straight sets, with the lone exception being Kilmer's come-from-behind three-set win at No. 4, capped by a 10-1 win in the super tiebreaker.
Zelikovsky went 3-0 last weekend, including the two singles wins and another in doubles with Kilmer. The duo also had a doubles match abandoned when Bucknell clinched the point.
Zelikovsky, Bucknell's lone senior, is now 12-1 in singles and 9-3 in doubles dating back to the start of the fall season. His 12 singles wins are tied with Bain (12-4) for the most on the team, with Tahirovic (11-2) and Kilmer (10-2) also reaching double figures.
Zelikovsky upped his career singles record to 54-22, with the 54 wins ranking T-13th in team history. He needs only five more wins to jump into the top 10.
Tahirovic, who plays both No. 1 singles and doubles, leads the team with 15 doubles victories against only four defeats.
All told, the Bison have a combined 70-27 record in singles and 39-20 in doubles on the full season.

Rider at a Glance/Series History

The Broncs have a 2-6 record in dual matches this season, with the wins coming against Lafayette and Sacred Heart.
Last Friday, Rider dropped a pair of matches to Navy, falling 7-0 and 6-1 in Annapolis.
Rider hosts Villanova this Friday before Bucknell visits on Saturday.
Junior Dhruv Tangri (2-2) and freshman Matthew Griscti (0-3) have split time at the No. 1 singles spot. Tangri advanced to the Round of 64 at the ITA Northeast Regional in the fall before losing a three-set match to Penn's Parashar Bharadwaj.
Jaime de Jaraiz secured the team's lone point against Navy last week with a 6-0, 6-3 win over Eric Liu at No. 6 singles.
Bucknell and Rider were former cohorts in the East Coast Conference. The Bison have won the last 12 head-to-head matches and lead the all-time series 16-2, although the two teams have not met since 2001.
In that most recent meeting 23 years ago, the Bison rolled to a 7-0 verdict, winning each of the bottom four singles matches by 6-0, 6-0 scorelines. Alex Davydov won at No. 1 singles, followed by Scott Allen, Jeff Gould, Todd Jacobs, Hayes Hopple, and Ira Brownstein.

Next Up

Following the Rider match, the Bison will be off until Sunday, Feb. 18, when they travel to Elkton, Md., to take on Delaware. The Blue Hens are off to a great start this spring with a 6-1 win over William & Mary and a 5-2 win at Penn State this past Saturday.