Williams College to host Wilson/ITA New England Men's Tennis Championships
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Play outdoors will be on the Torrence M. Hunt Tournament Courts and if the weather forces play indoors both Lansing Chapman Rink and Towne Field House will be used.
The Wilson/ITA New England Men's Championships will feature the top NCAA Division III schools in the region. The singles and doubles champions from this weekend's tournament advance to the Oct. 16-19 Intercollegiate Tennis Association (ITA) National Small College Championships at the Copeland-Cox Tennis Center in Mobile, Alabama.
Six of the top 25 teams in Division III will be on hand this weekend for the tournament: Middlebury (7), Williams (8), Bowdoin (11), Trinity (12), Amherst (15), and Bates (22).
Top seeds in this year's singles event include Bowdoin sophomore Stephen Sullivan, the top seed, who finished last season ranked fifth nationally. Spencer Feldman of Trinity, seeded second, lost in the finals to the Ephs' Dan Greenberg last fall. Amherst's Zack Lerner and Bates' Ben Stein were both semi-finalists last fall..
Bates' number one doubles team of Ben Stein and Amrit Rupasinghe has been awarded the top seed. Stein/Rupasinghe advanced to last spring's NCAA Championships semi-final round.
Singles:
1. Stephen Sullivan (Soph.) - Bowdoin
2. Spencer Feldman (Jr.) - Trinity
3. Zack Lerner (Sr.) - Amherst
4. Ben Stein (Sr.) - Bates
5. Conrad Olson (Sr.) - Middlebury
6. Andrew Peters (Soph.) - Middlebury
7. Nick Lebedoff (Jr.) - Williams
8. Bryan Brown (Sr.) - Colby
Doubles:
1. Ben Stein/Amrit Rupasinghe (Jr.) - Bates
2. Gautam Samarth (Sr.)/David Yahng (Sr.) - Trinity
3. Bryan Brown/Alex Chin (Sr.) - Colby
4. Nick Lebedoff/Bret Thacher (Sr.)- Williams
The ITA National Small College Championships began in 1986 and annually crowns men's and women's singles and doubles national champions in each of the ITA's four small college divisions (NCAA Divisions II and III, NAIA and Junior/Community College). These championships are the only national tournaments for singles and doubles at the NCAA Division II and NAIA level, and the only tournaments that combine the levels of Junior/Community Colleges (NJCAA and the California schools). Participants are determined through these Wilson/ITA Regional Championships, which serve as qualifying tournaments. The national champions from each division square off in the "Super Bowl" of Small College Tennis to determine the overall ITA National Small College Champions (who then earn berths into the ITA National Intercollegiate Indoor Championships, a Division I event, in November).
As the governing body of collegiate tennis the ITA promotes both the athletic and academic achievements of the collegiate tennis community. The ITA, which was founded in 1956 and is based in Skillman, N.J., administers numerous regional and national championships, the ITA Collegiate Summer Circuit presented by the USTA, and the ITA Rankings for men's and women's tennis at the NCAA Divisions I, II and III, NAIA and Junior/Community College. The ITA also has a comprehensive awards program for players and coaches to honor excellence in academics, leadership and sportsmanship.
