Top-5 tennis teams stroll to easy victories

After easily defeating No. 30 Notre Dame 6-1 Saturday, the No. 5 Duke men's tennis team turned around and defeated No. 8 Illinois in hostile Champaign, Ill., by a score of 4-3. The match against Illinois was one of the most difficult that the Blue Devils (3-0) have faced all year. No. 1 doubles pair Andres Pedroso and Ted Rueger lost their match against Amer Delic and Graydon Oliver 8-5, as did Duke's No. 2 doubles team of Ramsey Smith and Alex Bose, giving Illinois a point in doubles competition. Marko Cerenko and freshman Phillip King, who played No. 3 doubles, won their match against Jamal Parker and Michael Calkins 8-5. In singles competition against Illinois, Duke came back and won four of the six matches in front of the large Illinois home crowd. Playing at No. 2 singles, Smith won (6-4, 1-6, 6-4), while teammate and No. 3 singles Cerenko handily defeated Delic (7-5, 6-3). Pedroso lost at No. 4 in two sets to Mike Kosta (6-4, 6-4), while No. 1 Phillip King lost to Oliver in three sets (6-2, 5-7, 7-6). Both Duke sophomores Joel Spicher in No. 5 singles and Bose in No. 6 won in three sets, Spicher (6-4, 4-6, 6-3) and Bose (6-4, 5-7, 6-4). "This was a perfect weekend," Duke coach Jay Lapidus said. "Notre Dame was tough, but not as much as Illinois. [Illinois] was a match that pushed us to the limit." Winning was sweet for the Blue Devils not only for the fact that they won, but because they won in front of one of the largest home crowds they have ever faced. One of the factors in the match was, in fact, the size of the crowd and the level of noise that the players had to deal with. "[Illinois has a] very, very good home crowd that made a lot of noise," Lapidus said. "They have a very good vocal support group and large fan base; there were probably 400 to 500 people there. We're not used to playing in front of such an enthusiastic crowd. But it was fun for us to win in front of them and kind of silence the crowd." When the Blue Devils were in Indiana to play against Notre Dame (3-2) Saturday, it was a different story. Cerenko gave Duke a 2-0 lead with a (6-4, 6-1) win over Luis Haddock-Morales at No. 3 singles. Smith and Pedroso captured three-set singles victories that capped Duke's win over the Fighting Irish. Twenty-fifth-ranked Pedroso and Rueger fell in a tiebreaker at No. 1 doubles to 38th-ranked Javier Taborga and Aaron Talarico. In Nos. 2 and 3 doubles, Cerenko-King and Smith-Bose each won their doubles matches 8-5. "We were just a better team than they were," Cerenko said. "It was just a stepping stone in preparation for Illinois." The next tournament is fast approaching for the Blue Devils, who leave tomorrow to compete in the prestigious National Indoor Team Championships in Seattle, Wash. This is the tournament that will measure the teams that will be competing in the NCAA tournament in May. "This was a good preparation for Seattle because it was an indoor tournament," Bose said. "We're all looking forward to it, this is what we've been preparing for. It is second only to the NCAA tournament-only the best 16 teams in the country get to go."