PORTLAND, Ore. – The Portland men's tennis team pushed perennial West Coast Conference power San Diego, but the Toreros held on for a 5-2 win on Friday at the Louisiana Pacific Tennis Center. The Pilots fall to 2-3 overall and 0-1 in WCC play.

The Toreros (6-3, 4-0 WCC) secured the doubles point with a 6-1 win at No. 3 followed by a tiebreaker win at No. 1. The other doubles match was also headed to a tiebreaker when the point was clinched.

San Diego then jumped out to a 3-0 lead with wins at the No. 1 and No. 2 positions before Portland mounted a rally.

Nicolas Ocana put the Pilots on the board with a 6-3, 2-6, 7-5 win against Sacchitt Sharrma at No. 3 singles. Oscar Brown then outlasted Stian Klaassen 4-6, 6-3, 6-3 to make it a 3-2 score.

Neo Niedner clinched the match for USD with a straight sets win at No. 6 and Marvin Schaber closed the scoring with a three-set win at No. 5 singles.

"I'm pleased with our level of tennis and our level of competing today," Portland head coach Aaron Gross said. "USD is a very similar rated team as UCLA. I thought we made some great adjustments since then and played some very good tennis today. It's also very helpful to have Lefty back from Davis Cup. Nicolas Ocana and Oscar Brown were terrific today, and actually everyone competed really well against a very good team. I think it goes down as one of the longest matches we've ever had in the building running close to five hours and 45 minutes. Obviously, we would like to win, but we do our best to put our energy into the process and do everything we can on game day to give ourselves a chance. I think we did that today."

The Pilots will continue a busy weekend with a Saturday neutral site match against UNLV at the Nordstrom Tennis Center in Seattle at 1 p.m. Portland concludes the weekend by hosting Idaho State on Sunday at 11 a.m.
 
San Diego 5, Portland 2
Portland, Ore. (Louisiana Pacific Tennis Center)
February 17, 2023

Singles
1. #77 Iiro Vasa (USD) def. #72 Sema Pankin (POR) 6-4, 6-4
2. #102 Oliver Tarvet (USD) def. Eleftherios Neos (POR) 4-6, 7-6 (2), 6-1
3. Nicolas Ocana (POR) def. Sacchitt Sharrma (USD) 6-3, 2-6, 7-5
4. Oscar Brown (POR) def. Stian Klaassen (USD) 4-6, 6-3, 6-3
5. Marvin Schaber (USD) def. Nikolas Tvedt (POR) 6-7 (4), 6-1, 6-2
6. Neo Niedner (USD) def. Maxim Groysman (POR) 7-5, 6-2

Doubles
1. Sacchitt Sharrma/Iiro Vasa (USD) def. Sema Pankin/Nikolas Tvedt (POR) 7-6 (5)
2. Eleftherios Neos/Issa Yoshida (POR) vs. Lambert Ruland/Oliver Tarvet (USD) 6-6, unfinished
3. Marvin Schaber/Stian Klaassen (USD) def. Nicolas Ocana/Cade Fernando (POR) 6-1

Match Notes:
San Diego 6-3, 4-0 WCC
Portland 2-3, 0-1 WCC
Order of finish: Doubles (3,1); Singles (1,2,3,4,6,5)