Wetzel, Beren Reach Semis

When wins come, they come in bunches.

That is what Martin Wetzel and co-captain Jason Beren—both seniors on the Harvard men’s tennis team—learned as they reached the semifinals at the ITA National Intercollegiate Indoor Championships in Ann Arbor, Mich., this weekend.

Fresh off its regional championship run last week, the Crimson duo won on Thursday and Friday and extended its tally of consecutive victories to eight matches before falling to the tournament’s top seed in Saturday’s semifinal.

“We’ve been beating teams that were rated as the top teams in the country,” Beren said. “We’ll definitely have a national doubles ranking after this tournament.”

In the semifinal match, Wetzel and Beren faced the eventual-champion pairing from Ohio State. Though both teams held serve for the first nine games, the Buckeye duo broke serve to go up 6-4.

“We knew we had the potential to beat them,” Beren said. “But we played one sloppy game, involving a bad call or two on their part.”

Despite Beren and Wetzel’s best efforts, the Ohio State team never looked back, rolling to an 8-4 victory.

“We knew we were going to have to bring our game to the highest level,” Beren said. “But even in our loss today, we were still on par with them. That gives us a lot of confidence.”

The Harvard pairing’s powerful serves and solid groundstrokes overwhelmed their opponents in the first two matches.

After defeating a doubles team from Arkansas 8-6 in the first round, Wetzel and Beren carried the momentum into their quarterfinal match against a duo from Baylor. While each game was closely battled, the Crimson pairing broke serve in the third game and then held serve the rest of the way, winning 8-6.

“We’re becoming a much more cohesive unit,” Beren said. “We’re hoping that we’ll stay together and keep playing.”

Wetzel also competed in the singles draw. He came back from a one-set deficit to defeat Matias Silva of Boise State in the first round. He then lost in the second round, however, to Old Dominion’s Izak van der Merwe in another three-setter.

“Martin showed he had the game to play a high-caliber college match,” Beren said. “This proved that our team is strong all the way through our lineup.”

Also competing in the singles draw, co-captain Jonathan Chu, the Crimson’s top singles player, struggled to regain top form due to nagging injuries. Though he lost in straight sets in his first-round matchup, he defeated Henner Nehles of UNLV 6-4, 6-4 in the consolation draw on Friday before falling to Dante Cipulli of Southwest Baptist.

“My knee was pretty banged up coming into the first day,” Chu said. “I couldn’t really push myself that hard.”

Despite his early exit, Chu was pleased with the results of Harvard’s fall season. But that didn’t mean that he wasn’t ready for a little break.

“I know that I need to take a week or so off,” Chu said. “We’re all looking forward to taking care of our bodies in the offseason.”