Binghamton, NY – A home match originally scheduled to be played at the SUNY Oneonta tennis complex had to be moved to the Binghamton Tennis Center because of weather.

The Red Dragons have defeated RIT the last three-times they have played in very closely contested matches.  Today was no different but the RIT Tigers came up on the winning end of things today and dropped Oneonta to 4-6 on the year.  Doubles has been the undoing of the men's tennis team and that scenario played out today again.  The elusive big points in pivotal situations are not converted when needed and as a result the Red Dragons fell 3-0 after the doubles stanza.

Number one doubles junior Joseph D'Orazio (Smithtown/Smithtown) and junior Nicholas Fox (Commack/Commack) reunited as a team and played great tennis throughout getting breaks when needed but they dropped the 14^th game and settled for an 8-6 loss.  The same thing occurred at the number two flight as sophomore Marco Ammirati (Huntington/Huntington) and senior Zach Lasky (Colonie/Colonie) played well owning leads in the match, but could not hold them and were broken twice and then also lost that elusive 14^th game and went down 8-6.  Number three doubles senior Cole Laffite and freshman Riley Smith (Westhampton Beach/Westhampton Beach) were down 7-4 and fought back to get into a tiebreaker but were bested losing 8-7 (7-3).

With a 3-0 lead by RIT the Red Dragons made things very interesting with tight matches on all singles courts.  D'Orazio won the first set 7-5 but was set back in the second set 6-4 in the top position.  In the super-tiebreaker he was up 5-2 but faltered and lost 10-6.  Oneonta did get impressive wins in the fourth position with Fox gaining a victory 6-3, 7-6 (10-3).  Laffitte was overwhelmingly imposing as he took home a win in the fifth spot 6-3, 6-1.  Senior Tim Distler played very competitive and steady tennis securing a number six position win 7-6 (9-7), 6-3.  The three wins in singles were just not enough to overcome the 3-0 deficit after the doubles play.

The Red Dragon men now lick their wounds and get ready for another challenging match as they play Union College on Friday, April 6^th beginning at 4 PM on the campus of Union College.