A combination of talent, experience and depth propelled the undefeated Binghamton University men’s tennis team to two victories last weekend at the Reis Tennis Center in Ithaca.

On Saturday, the Bearcats (5-0) were able to avenge a 2-5 loss to Cornell last season by turning the tables on the Big Red and coming up with an impressive 5-2 victory.

“It just means that our team has gotten much better from a year ago,” said head coach Adam Cohen. “We’re just a much deeper team than we were back then and I think that when you can go back to a place where you lost 2-5 and then win it’s a good sign.”

Junior Sven Vloedgraven, the top-ranked player in the Northeast, was a key contributor for the Bearcats as he won both his singles and doubles matches. At No. 1 singles, he faced a familiar opponent in Andy Gauthier. Vloedgraven recently knocked out Gauthier in the semifinals of the fall ITA Northeast Regional Tournament by a score of 7-6, 6-3. Proving that the win was no fluke, Vloedgraven made even quicker work of Gauthier this time around by posting a 6-2, 6-4 victory.

Vloedgraven also teamed up with partner Gilbert Wong to defeat Gauthier and Jeremy Feldman 8-6 to claim the win in the No. 1 doubles spot. Vloedgraven and Wong have been a force to reckon with all season, as the pair are ranked eighth in the Northeast in doubles competition.

Senior Moshe Levy and sophomore Alexandre Haggai then provided the crucial victory that was needed to claim the doubles point when they defeated Jonathan Jaklitsch and Mirza Kliz, 9-7.

“It went a little bit back-and-forth at the beginning,” Cohen said. “Everybody that served got broken and after four games it was 2-2 which was a little unusual. We got down 7-5 but then we finally broke serve and then held to go 7-7. Then we broke them again to go up 8-7 and then played one more good game. We played our best doubles at the end, which was a good sign. Under pressure our guys just played the bigger points better.”

A day later, on Sunday, the Bearcats took to the courts once more and steamrolled over Marist College with a score of 6-1, improving their record to 5-0. They were able to provide a clean sweep of all three doubles matches and then took five of the six singles matches as well.

Cohen has been pleased by the play of his doubles teams in recent weeks.

“We lost the first doubles point of the year to Brown and I made a little bit of a change and put Moshe with Alex and they have yet to lose,” he said. “It doesn’t mean that they’re not going to lose sometime this season, but I think our guys know that if we get ahead 1-0 then we’re going to be a tough team to beat. It will be tough for a lot of teams to beat us four out of the six singles spots with the depth that we’ve got.”

In addition to the impressive doubles performance, Haggai also shined in the No. 2 singles spot by rolling over Loic Sessagesimi 6-4, 6-0.

“Alex has lost three tough matches recently that could have easily gone his way,” said Cohen. “For him to come out and beat a guy 6-4, 6-0 who made the quarterfinals of the regional tournament that Sven won, shows that he hasn’t been getting discouraged by so many close loses early in the season.”

The Bearcats have a week off before taking on Columbia, the Northeast’s top-ranked team, on Feb. 19.

“We look forward to the challenge,” Cohen stated. “They’re ranked 53rd in the country and we beat Drake a year ago who was about at that level as well, so we know that we can play with those kinds of teams and I hope our guys are excited for that opportunity.”