Mary Washington Freshmen Evan Charles And Donato Rizzolo Advance to NCAA Men's Tennis Doubles Quarterfinals
![Mary Washington Freshmen Evan Charles And Donato Rizzolo Advance to NCAA Men's Tennis Doubles Quarterfinals](/images/mten/2011-2012/charles.jpg?max_width=650)
In one of the most thrilling matches of the day at the NCAA Championships, University of Mary Washington freshmen Evan Charles and Donato Rizzolo won their first round doubles match in three sets to advance to the national quarterfinals on Friday.
The freshman duo topped Kyle Gerber and John Healey of Case
Western Reserve, 5-7, 6-2, 7-6 (1) in gaining All-America honors by
advancing to the final eight.
In a rematch from the regular season in which Case Western won,
8-6, the Eagles dropped two points on serve in the first set in
falling, 7-5. UMW jumped ahead early in the second and scored four
straight points in a 6-2 second set win.
In the third, UMW held serve twice in gaining a 2-1 lead, but
Case broke the Eagles to assume a 3-2 lead, and carried the lead to
4-3. The Eagles broke serve, then both teams held for a 6-5 UMW
advantage. Case held serve at 6-5 to force the match to a
tiebreaker, which the Eagles dominated, winning 7-1, with Rizzolo's
ace for the match-clinching point the exclamation point to the
hard-fought win.
The Eagles advance to face Mark Bloom and Patrick Lipscomb of the
University of Redlands on Friday at 2:00 p.m., with the winner
advancing to the semifinals. UMW's Paul Bristow and Dan Uyar won
the NCAA Doubles Championship in 2004.