Oct. 18, 2012
Tallahassee, Fla. – Georgia Tech freshman Garrett Gordon picked up a pair of singles wins in the qualifying draw Thursday, and advanced to the main draw of the USTA/ITA Southeast Regional.
Following a first-round bye, Gordon captured a straight-set win over Georgia Southern’s Marco Osorio, 6-4, 7-6 (5). The Marietta, Ga., freshman then defeated Moore of Florida Gulf Coast, 6-3, 7-5, earning himself a first-round main draw match Friday against the third seed of the tournament, Hernus Pieters of Georgia.
Anish Sharma, a Tech freshman from Alpharetta, Ga., dropped his first-round qualifying match Thursday to Bernardo Craveiro of North Florida, 6-7 (4), 6-4, 6-3.
“[Gordon] played the critical points better today than he has all fall,” said Tech coach Kenny Thorne. “He kept good composure and worked through adversity well. He has some areas that he can and will improve but he looked confident in what he wants to accomplish this fall. Anish lost a match that lasted over four hours, and he fought well. His improvement is going to come when he relaxes a bit more at key moments. We changed a few things technically in his serve and he actually hit it.
“We have a full day of matches tomorrow with some tough matchups that will test our entire team. We are looking forward to it. “
Juan Spir, a senior from Medellin, Colombia, who won one match before being eliminated in the ITA All-American Championship two weeks ago, is ranked 30th nationally among singles players and seeded No. 2 in the main draw of singles. He will open play Friday at 1 p.m. against a survivor from the qualifying draw, Casey Kay of Georgia.
Juan Melian, Tech’s other senior from Las Palmas, Spain, faces seeded player Jordi Vives of Florida Gulf Coast in his first-round match at 9 a.m. Friday. Other first-round matches for Tech include freshman Nathan Rakitt of Marietta, Ga., against North Florida’s Moritz Buercher, and sophomore Vikram Hundal of Alpharetta, Ga., against South Florida’s Ravi Patel.
Spir and Hundal are paired in doubles for the Jackets and have drawn the top seed, getting a first-round bye. They will take on Florida A&M’s Chidi Gabriel and Admire Mushonga in a round of 32 match Friday. Melian and Rakitt take on Alex Toliver and Alexander Pena of Kentucky in a qualifying match Thursday. Gordon and Sharma also have a first-round bye before taking on Jordan Kelly-Houston and Anderson Reed of Florida State in the round of 32.
The USTA/ITA Southeast Regional runs through Monday, when championship matches will be played. The champions of the singles and doubles draws at the regional championships will advance to the USTA/ITA National Indoor Intercollegiate Championships Nov. 8-11 at the USTA Billie Jean King National Tennis Center in Flushing, N.Y.
