Box Score

Flushing, NY - On Monday evening, the men's tennis team took on the Dolphins of the College of Staten Island in the CUNYAC/Hospital for Special Surgery semi-final round at the USTA National Tennis Center. After the three doubles matches, the Hawks found themselves down 2-1 heading into singles play. However, they bounced back to tie the match 4-4 as sophomore Arthur Kapetanakis, down 3-2 in the third set, rallied to victory and secured the fifth and final team point to keep their championship run alive. The 5-4 win puts the Hawk's record at 10-4 while CSI ends their season at 16-5.

Yevgeny Perepelov and Luis Quintero teamed up at first singles and defeated Nicholas Zikos and Patrick Thomas 8-4 for Hunter's first win. Kapetanakis and Roy Forberg fell to Joe Taranto and Riad Hamai 8-4 in second doubles and Thomas Lin and Mark Goldfinger also dropped their match 8-2 to Georgio Dano and Masaru Takaki before heading into singles action.

Lin was defeated at fifth singles, allowing CSI to take a 3-1 lead, but Quintero and Perepelov came out on top at second and first singles with scores of 6-2, 6-1 and 6-1, 6-4 respectively to knot the match at three a piece.

After Goldfinger dropped his match at sixth singles, the Dolphins were just a game away from ending the Hawks' season. However, Forberg prevailed at third singles 6-1, 7-5 to keep his team alive. Kapetanakis, playing in the fourth slot, won the first set, 6-2 over Taranto, but then dropped the second 3-6 and found himself down 3-2 in the deciding set. With all the attention of the fans and his teammates on his game, he managed to tie it at three and used that momentum to go on and win the next three games to put away his opponent 6-3 and give his team a chance to defend their title in the finals.

The Hawks will take on Baruch College in the Championship on Thursday, May 5 at the USTA National Tennis Center beginning at 5pm.