April 25, 2008

Larimore is Only PLU Player to Win a Match at Ojai

OJAI, Calif. - Pacific Lutheran senior Justin Larimore was the only Pacific Lutheran men's tennis player to win a match on Friday at the Ojai Valley Tournament, which features most of the top NCAA Division III tennis players on the West Coast.

Larimore won his first match in singles, defeating Ben Hough from Claremont-Mudd-Scripps, 2-6, 6-3, 6-3. Later in the day, his drive to the Round of 16 was derailed by Silvio Chiba from UC Santa Cruz, who beat Larimore, 6-3, 6-3. The original report out of Ojai was the Larimore had defeated Chiba, but while the score was correct it turned out that Chiba had indeed defeated Larimore.

The other PLU players all dropped their first-round matches. Kevin Floyd lost a close 7-5, 7-5 decision to Kevin Wong from Redlands, and Justin Peterson dropped a 6-4, 6-2 contest to Mike Reading, also from Redlands. Michael Manser took Michael Starr from Claremont-Mudd-Scripps to a third set before losing, 5-7, 6-0, 6-4.

In doubles play, Larimore and Floyd, the No. 5 seed, lost to Kian Fattahi and Colin Mark-Griffin from UC Santa Cruz, 8-1, while Manser and Peterson dropped an 8-2 decision to the Redlands pair of Wong and Jeff Hammond.

The Lutes' season thus comes to an end with a 15-11 dual match record and a second-place finish in the Northwest Conference regular season standings and postseason tournament.

- PLU -