LOS ANGELES, Calif. – The Portland men's tennis team came back from a big deficit to secure a thrilling 4-3 road victory over the Loyola Marymount Lions Friday afternoon at the LMU Tennis Center. The Pilots improve to 7-8 overall and 3-2 in West Coast Conference play with the victory, while the Lions drop to 5-14 and 0-5 in league play.

"That was one of the grittiest performances I've been a part of in 25 years of coaching," Portland head coach Aaron Gross said. "It's 95 degrees here and we lost the doubles point and we lost four out of the six first sets of the singles matches before getting the win."
 
The Lions went up early by stealing an extremely competitive doubles point. Portland's No. 24-ranked doubles tandem of Sema Pankin and Eleftherios Neos took a 7-5 win at the No. 1 spot, but the Lions won 7-5 at No. 2 and 7-6 at No. 3 to go ahead 1-0.

LMU made it 2-0 with a straight sets win at No. 4 singles, but Pankin put the Pilots on the board with a 7-6, 6-2 win over Dane Esses at the top of the lineup. The four remaining singles matches all went three sets.

Pilot freshman Oscar Brown tied the overall score with a 6-2, 3-6, 6-3 victory against Rana-Roop Bhullar at No. 6 singles. The Lions went ahead 3-2 after John Otico outlasted Nicolas Ocana 6-2, 3-6, 6-4 at No. 3. Neos and sophomore Nikolas Tvedt both needed to come back from a set down and each did just that to secure the team victory.

Neos defeated Jose Dominiquez 4-6, 6-4, 6-3 at the No. 2 position to tie it up and then Tvedt won a marathon deciding match against Austin Di Giulio at No. 5 singles. Tvedt fought off numerous match points and defeated Di Giulio in a third set tiebreaker to cap the impressive comeback.

"Nik Tvedt saved six match points to clinch it for us," Gross said. "Oscar, Sema and Lefty all came up huge. The extreme conditions and the fact that it's on the road against a tough conference opponent made it really special. I'm really happy with the fight our guys showed today."

The Pilots will conclude the weekend road trip Saturday at No. 22 Pepperdine. The match will start at 1 p.m. with live coverage links available at PortlandPilots.com.
 
Portland 4, Loyola Marymount 3
Los Angeles, Calif. (LMU Tennis Center)
April 8, 2022

Singles
1. Sema Pankin (POR) def. Dane Esses (LMU) 7-6, 6-2
2. Eleftherios Neos (POR) def. Jose Dominiquez (LMU) 4-6, 6-4, 6-3
3. John Otico (LMU) def. Nicolas Ocana (POR) 6-2, 3-6, 6-4
4. Emin Torlic (LMU) def. Issa Yoshida (POR) 6-3, 6-4
5. Nikolas Tvedt (POR) def. Austin Di Giulio (LMU) 4-6, 6-4, 7-6
6. Oscar Brown (POR) def. Rana-Roop Bhullar (LMU) 6-2, 3-6, 6-3

Doubles
1. #24 Neos/Pankin (POR) def. Roberts/Nguyen (LMU) 7-5
2. Dominiquez/Ranaivo (LMU) def. Ocana/Tvedt (POR) 7-5
3. Torlic/Di Giulio (LMU) def. Yoshida/Oberg (POR) 7-6

Match Notes:
Portland 7-8, 3-2 WCC
LMU Men's Tennis 5-14, 0-5 WCC
Order of finish: Doubles (1,2,3); Singles (4,1,6,3,2,5)