The Kennesaw State men’s tennis team finished its season at the Atlantic Sun Conference Tournament last week, reaching the semifinals of the event for the third time in the past four seasons.
Beginning the tournament on Thursday, April 18, the Owls defeated host team Stetson 4-2 in the quarterfinals before falling to Florida Gulf Coast 4-0 in the semifinals on Saturday.
On Thursday, in the penultimate singles match of senior Fermin Calvo Barcelo’s college career, he earned a 7-5, 6-3 victory to further cement himself in KSU tennis history.
Calvo Barcelo is the defending ASUN Player of the Year and is the all-time leader in career singles match wins for the Owls.
Earlier in the day, fellow senior Lucas de Torres Curth helped KSU clinch the doubles point as his decorated career neared its end.
He was on the ASUN All-Freshman team three years ago, was on the All-Doubles team his sophomore year and was on the All-Academic team last season.
Also helping the Owls beat the Hatters were sophomore Bryan Triana and freshman Jose Galvez, with the latter winning the clinching point to send KSU to the semifinals on Saturday.
“We were very proud of the boys today,” Director of Tennis Matt Emery said. “This was a great team effort across the board and Jose came up big for us again at the end.”
The Owls could not keep up their momentum from the Stetson victory against FGCU, as the Eagles won in a clean sweep.
KSU lost the doubles point on Friday before the singles matches were pushed to Saturday for inclement weather.
Opening the next day was Galvez, who lost 6-3, 6-4 to round out his freshman campaign. Triana and de Torres Curth had identical losses, both falling in tight 7-5 first sets before dropping the second set 6-2.
Calvo Barcelo and junior Sebastian Osorio were leading their matches in the third set when FGCU clinched their winning point against de Torres Curth. Freshman Gaston Muhammad had also taken his match to three sets when the Eagles won.
“Our guys played their hearts out and left everything on the court,” Emery said. “I want to thank our two seniors, Fermin and Lucas. Their leadership and buy-in this season was invaluable and certainly made our jobs as a staff easier.”
Despite the loss, the Owls reached just their third ASUN semifinal in program history and have much to look forward to next season, even without the two seniors.
The ups and downs of the men’s tennis season were reflected with a final record of 11-13, the same margin as last season’s 9-11 campaign.
First-year coach Emery faced a unique challenge this year as the makeup of the team was far different from before. With a team consisting of six freshmen out of the 12 players on the roster, Emery had to carefully balance the participation rates of the players in each event.
As next season comes around, new leaders will emerge and all of the freshmen will have the chance to progress their skills. Meanwhile, the continued presence of former KSU player Simon Pritchard as an assistant coach will help the team as a whole.
Emery will begin his second season as Director in the fall and will look to strengthen a roster that will still be youthful.
