Rome, Ga. -
Advik Mareedu overcame a slow start to earn a match point in the third set, but Ruilin Feng of Emory was able to fight it off and captured a 6-1, 4-6, 7-5 win in the ITA Cup singles championship match on Sunday morning at the Rome Tennis Center.
Sibi Raja and
Henry Wilson also ended as runners-up in doubles, falling in a third-set match tiebreak 10-6 to Ajay Kartik and Matthew Johnstone of Emory.
The loss ends Mareedu's winning streak against Division III opponents at 44 matches, after going 36-0 last year and beginning this year with eight straight victories. He also fell one win shy of earning his third ITA Cup title, after winning them in 2022 and 2024.
The singles championship match was moved indoors due to rain early on Sunday morning. Mareedu struggled with his timing and accuracy in the early going, falling in the first set 6-1 and then getting behind an early break on a let cord dribbler at deuce in the first game of the second. However, he broke back to even the set at 3-3, and then receiving at 4-5 deuce and set point in the second, he ripped a backhand winner off an underhand serve to even the match..
Mareedu again had to battle back in the third, falling behind 3-1, but responded with three straight games to take a 4-3 and 40-30 lead. On the next point, as Mareedu was hitting a forehand winner to consolidate his second break of the set, an errant ball from an adjacent court interrupted play and the point was replayed. Feng went on to hold serve for 4-all, before Marredu took a 5-4 lead in the third and got a deuce point and match point on Feng's serve. Mareedu's backhand approach shot down the line was met with a backhand passing shot winner from Feng that evened the match at 5-all. Feng then broke for a 6-5 lead and got up 40-15 with a chance to close it out. Mareedu fought off the first match point, but Feng closed it out on yet another backhand pass to earn the title.
Raja and Wilson split two sets in their doubles championship to go to a match tiebreaker. Kartik and Johnstone took the first set 6-3, and Raja and Wilson saved two match points at 4-5, 30-40, and then broke on a deuce point at 5-5 in the second set to go up 6-5. They then held serve for a 7-5 win in the second set. Rather than play a full third set as scheduled, both team agreed to play a decisive match tie-break so that CMS could make their flight back to California. At 1-all in the tie-break, a hard rain interrupted play so the teams moved indoors. Raja and Wilson earned a 5-4 lead in the tie-break with Wilson serving, but the Emory duo raised their level to win six of the next eight points and take the championship.
Raja and Wilson, who began their ITA journey as an unseeded team in the West Regionals, advanced to the ITA Cup finals yesterday by fighting off four match points in an 18-16 third-set tiebreaker over Jacob Linares and Nicholas Fischer of Hobart.