Last week, the Bucknell Men’s Tennis Team hosted a three-day tournament, known as the Bucknell Invitational, from Friday, Sept. 1 to Sunday, Sept 3.
Over the course of the event, each player competed in three singles matches and three doubles matches.
The Bison started off Friday strong as they dominated the singles flight. All eight Orange and Blue players won singles matches in straight sets to create a combined game score of 96-26. Seven of those wins came from matches against Patriot League rival Lafayette.
At the top singles flight, Amar Tahirovic ’26 led the way with his 6-0, 6-0 victory. Teammates Adam Stavrakas ’26 (6-0, 6-1), Brendan McDonald ’26 (6-3, 6-2), Oscar Bain Moreno de Vega ’26 (6-1, 6-2) and Tim Zelikovsky ’24 (6-1, 6-4) all followed with wins.
In their collegiate debuts, Bucknell’s three first-years Liam Kilmer ’27 (6-2, 6-3), Ethan Esclamado ’27 (6-1, 6-3) and Will Robinson ’27 (6-2, 6-3) also secured victories.
Entering the second day of play, the Bison geared up for two rounds of doubles and one round of singles. Bucknell’s team went 7-1 in doubles and 6-2 in singles.
The double pairs of Tahirovic/Bain, Stravakas/McDonald and Zelikovsky/Kilmer all went 2-0, while the all-first-year pairing of Esclamado/Robinson split their matches.
Tahirovic and Bain pulled out a 9-7 tiebreaker to win their opening match in the top flight. Their second match was much quicker against a Lafayette duo and the Bison won 6-2.
Against Mount St. Mary’s, the Bucknell tandems of Stravakas/McDonald and Esclamado/Robinson all won close matches.
Bucknell and Mount St. Mary’s faced off in eight singles matches on Saturday with the Bison successfully securing six wins. Tahirovic, Stavrakas, Bain, Zelikovsky, Kilmer and Robinson were all victorious for the Bison. All their matches were straight sets, except for Zelikovsky’s match as he held on to win 11-9 in a third-set super tiebreaker.
On Sunday, the Bison wrapped up the invitational with champions in six of eight singles groups and two of the four doubles flights.
Overall, within the single groups, Tahirovic clinched the Blue, Stravakas topped the Orange, McDonald secured the White, Bain won the Grey, Zelikovsky exceeded in the Bison and Kilmer defeated the Red.
In the doubles flight, Tahirovic/Bain were champions in the Blue group, while Zelikovsky/Kilmer were on top of the White group.
Tahirovic, Stavrakas, Bain, Zelikosvky and Kilmer all finished off the weekend with a perfect 3-0 record.
Bucknell will be traveling to Villanova this Friday, Sept. 8 to play another three-day invitational.
