This season has not been easy for the EWU men’s tennis team, but they still managed to do well in the month of March.

Winning six consecutive games in March, the team is looking to end this season with a positive outlook. “The guys have been playing really great on the road. That road trip, the guys came in really focused,” head coach Darren Haworth said.

According to Haworth, the team was determined to sweep the three away games that they played in March. The team has had a lot of injuries this year; this caused other players to step into new roles. “It’s been a really great opportunity for guys like Stefan Farrar and Arturo Carpio and Eduardo Bringold to get the chance to play a little bit higher in the lineup and get exposed to some better talent,” Haworth said.

On March 2, the Eagles defeated Northern Colorado, 5-2. On March 8, they played Pacific Lutheran and ended up winning 7-0. March 12, the team went up against North Dakota where they also had a victory of 7-0.

On the road they managed to keep the winning streak going. The Eagles started off with a 6-1 win against Seattle University in Las Vegas on March 26. The team also defeated Southern Utah with a 7-0 win on March 27. Finally, the team ended the road trip with a 5-2 victory on March 28 against Northern Arizona.

According to Haworth, the team has not really done anything differently since those consecutive wins in March. “We’ve just been playing pretty good teams. We haven’t changed a whole lot up,” Haworth said. The team has been working hard on the tennis court and they have been conditioning heavily this season.

One of the main successes of the team has been No.1 Joseph Cohen. He has managed to stay dominant throughout the season, despite the struggles of the team earlier this year. “I feel like every match I’ve played good tennis, and I managed to keep it up repetitively,” Cohen said. According to Cohen, he has simply been playing solid tennis consistently.

As a team, the Eagles still want to be able to qualify for the conference tournament. This was a goal that they have had since the beginning. For Cohen, this was not the season he expected to have. “We lost a lot of players last year, we had a lot of freshmen come in, so that made [the season] quite hard,” Cohen said.

Before the winning streak, the team had lost consecutive games in the previous months. They managed to make up the losses with the successful run in March. Haworth is still optimistic about the season.

“We battled some injuries and I think that if we get into that top six, the season will be a success,” Haworth said.

As the season is coming to an end and the team is fighting to get into the postseason, No. 3 freshman Tomas Aranguiz has learned a few things. “At this level, the competition is much better. I think players at this college level are always trying to win,” Aranguiz said

Aranguiz takes college competition seriously, “You have to fight, and you cannot [take] anything for granted.
You have to give everything you have in order to win each game,” Aranguiz said.

One thing that Haworth will take with him after this season and for the future is fitness. “The Big Sky is a really diverse conference where you play at different altitudes, and you play different conditions. I think it all comes down to how important fitness really is,” Haworth said.

“I think going on to the future, I want to continue to really work on fitness and making the guys tougher, and it makes them mentally tougher as well,” Haworth said.