5/4/14

West Windsor, NJ -

Mercer men's tennis narrowly missed qualifying for the Division III NJCAA National Championship following a great opening day at the Region 19 Championship held at Mercer County Park.  The Vikings finished with 8 points, which tied Brookdale for third place and the final qualifying spot, but because Brookdale had more players advance to the finals, they won the tie breaker and final spot for Nationals.  The Vikings reached the Semifinals in 8 of 9 flights in the Championship.  All three doubles temas advanced to the Semifinals including sophomore Dario Moriello (Ewing, NJ/Notre Dame) and freshman Louie Dias (Bordentown, NJ/Marvel) at 1st Doubles, sophomores Stefan Neagu (Hamilton, NJ/West Windsor South) and Nick Mastalesz (Hamilton, NJ/Steinert) at 2nd Doubles and freshmen Ebrahim al-Areqi (Pennington, NJ) and Tyler Sincoskie (Mount Holly, NJ/Rancocas Valley) at 3rd Doubles.  Dias reached the Semfinals at 2nd Singles, Neagu at 4th Singles, Mastalesz at 5th Singles and Sincoskie at 6th Singles.  al-Areqi reached the Semifinals at 3rd Singles and lost a 3.5 hour 3 set match to eventual flight champion Eric Sapiro of Bergen 6-4, 5-7, 6-4.  The Vikings finished the season 11-8.