In what promises to be two grueling days of premier tennis action, the Whitman men’s tennis team will do battle with conference rivals Pacific Lutheran University and the University of Puget Sound Feb. 6-7.

Coming off of a hard-fought victory against NAIA powerhouse Lewis-Clark State on Jan. 24, the team hopes to keep its momentum and start the conference season off with a bang.

The two matches will be a test for the team, says coach Jeff Northam, as the team is dealing with the loss of former number one singles player, Matt Solomon, to Div. 1 Boise State. However, Northam is optimistic.

“With Matt leaving it makes everyone have to jump up a little bit and play a little better,” said Northam. “Without a doubt it is a major blow to the program to lose Matt. On the other hand, we do have one of the better teams in the nation. We’ve got a lot of really competitive guys on the team and it’s a great opportunity for them.”

One of these players is second-year Etienne Moshevich. Moshevich is back and healthy after sitting out all of last season due to injury.

“It really hurt to lose Etienne last year to a shoulder injury,” said Northam. “But, taking a year off, he’s really excited to play. He played great against Lewis and Clark: he actually won us the match in three sets at number one. We’re really excited to see Etienne be healthy and be able to play.”

The first match of the conference season will be against UPS, a team that co-captain Justin Hayashi, expects to beat pretty soundly.

“It will be a good first match just because they are middle of the pack in the conference. But UPS is definitely a team that we should win against pretty easily,” Hayashi said.

The team is more anxious about their second match against perennial arch-rival, PLU. Last year, Whitman and PLU played for the conference title with Whitman eventually coming out on top.

Senior Co-captain Christoph Fuchs is hoping the PLU match will send a message to the rest of the conference.

“We are really looking forward to playing our conference rival PLU in the second match,” said Fuchs. “We’re hoping to send a message to the conference that we are the team to beat, even if we don’t have Matt this season.”

Discounting Solomon, the team from last year has remained essentially intact, with exciting additions like Moshevich adding some firepower.
Coach Northam feels confident that they can repeat this year and once again be conference champs.

“We’ll certainly go in as the favorites,” said Northam. “I feel confident going after it.”

Senior Justin Hayashi also feels confident that the team can pull it off. Part of the reason for their success, he feels, is the very real fellowship the guys feel for one another.

“It’s like a family,” said Hayashi. “We all joke around with each other and everyone does a really good job of supporting each other: it’s not just me. So even if I’m feeling down or having a bad day, I can count on even a freshman or sophomore to lift my spirits.”