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Men's Tennis Volleys Army

The Harvard men's tennis team began it Eastern Intercollegiate Tennis Association (EITA) season Saturday at Palmer Dixon Tennis Courts with a decisive 6-1 win over Army. Army  1 Harvard  6

The Crimson (9-1, 1-0 EITA), coming off a successful weekend at the Corpus Christi Invitational Tournament, won all three doubles matches handily and--despite some last-minute line-up shuffling at singles--won five of the six singles matches.

"It was tough because we weren't used to playing indoors," junior Dan Chung said. "We played outdoors in Texas and after taking a couple of days off we started hitting indoors here only yesterday."

The Cadets didn't figure to pose much of a challenge to the more talented Crimson squad, which the doubles action certainly confirmed.

The first-doubles tandem of sophomore Mitty Arnold and freshman Black and the second-doubles team of juniors Todd Meringoff and Adam Valkin both were victorious in their respective matches 8-4

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In third doubles action, Chung teamed up with sophomore Stuart Murray to walk all over the Cadets 8-1.

Following the doubles matches, coach Dave Fish scratched freshman Philip Tseng and Arnold from the singles line-up.

With captain Andrew Rueb already sitting out the match to rest his ailing knee, the Crimson entered the singles portion of the contest without its top three singles starters.

"They [Army] didn't look very good in doubles so the coach pulled a couple of guys out for singles," Chung said.

Even without its top guns, however, the Crimson held its own on the courts.

Chung opened the singles action with a 6-4, 6-2, win at third singles, dictating the action from the baseline throughout the match.

At fifth singles, freshman Jose Hernandez Ore, who was making his first varsity dual-match start, split the first two sets, 7-6, 4-6.

In the deciding set, however, Hernandez Ore was not to be stopped and amidst cheers of "Jose...Jose...Jose...Jose...Jose" he won 6-0.

"I've been training all fall to get used to the hard courts," said Hernandez Ore, who grew up playing on clay courts in Peru. "It's taken me two months but I'm really happy with the results."

The Crimson clinched the match in dramatic fashion at second singles with Blake's third-set tie-breaker win.

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