The Ashland University’s men’s tennis team concluded their fall season by hosting the Spreng-Smith Invitational on October 11-12 with success all across the board.

“They were hungry and eager for the competition,” assistant tennis coach Christian Hamilton said.

Senior Tennis Player, Priyank Soni, was notable in the overall success of the invitational, taking the top spot in the Draw A Singles set He won every one of his matches, which eventually gave him the top spot of the weekend.

Other notable accomplishments of the invitational were the victories achieved by duo Colten Clark and Jordan Phelps, who made the finals of the B draw.

“They set a tone throughout the whole invitational that Ashland Tennis was going to fight tooth and nail in every point of every match.”
Hamilton said that the Eagles set the tone early in the invitational and that they were going to fight tooth and nail in every match.

“That level of toughness can be extremely difficult to beat,” Hamilton said. “We were very competitive throughout the whole tournament from top to bottom and played good Division II teams. We made five of the six finals and won two of them. Our men train with a mindset that every time we stop onto the court, we are working towards our team goals.”

One of the two victories was thanks to Soni, who won the toughest set of the invitational with scores of 6-4 and 7-5.

“I wanted someone from Ashland, our university, to win the tournament,” Soni said.

Eagle pride was also echoed by freshman tennis player, Jacob Hoffman, who earned a second-place finish in the D Draw Singles Bracket.
Throughout the invitational, Hoffman said a sentiment kept running through his mind: “Defend the turf.”

The AU men’s tennis team will be training in their off-season, until they can return to defend the turf once again for the spring season, which will begin on Feb. 1.