PHILADELPHIA – The University of Pennsylvania men's tennis team moved to 2-0 in Ivy League play, running its winning streak to five and its home winning streak to 22 with a thrilling, 4-3 victory over #30 Cornell Friday afternoon at the Hamlin Tennis Center.

Penn swept doubles action for the early point with Manfredi Graziani and Aditya Gupta picking up a quick 6-1 win at No. 3, followed by Zachery Lim/Harsh Parikh taking their match at No. 2, 6-4.

Gupta took the first singles match to go final (6-1, 6-3), putting Penn up 2-0, but Cornell came back with three of the next four matches to knot things at 3-all. Zhu won his match at No. 2 in straight sets, with the deciding point coming down to an epic clash for Parikh at No. 4.

The senior and Cornell's Adit Sinha split the first two sets, each winning 6-3. Up 4-3 in the third, Parikh broke for a two-game lead and a chance to serve out the match, but Sinha broke Parikh right back, then held serve to make it 5-5. Each man held on their next service game, sending the lone three-set match of the day to a tiebreak at 6-all.

After a back-and-forth battle in front of a high-energy crowd that grew louder in size and volume with each point, Parikh finally put the match away on his serve, taking the tiebreak 11-9, igniting a euphoric celebration from both the team and the fans.

Up Next
Penn continues Ivy League play Sunday on the road against #11 Columbia. First serve is scheduled for 1 p.m.

Results

DOUBLES
1 – Edoardo Graziani/Zhu (P) vs. Nathan Mao/Adit Sinha (C) – 4-5 DNF
2 – Lim/Parikh (P) def. Vladislav Melnic/Radu Papoe (C) – 6-4
3 – M. Graziani/Gupta (P) def. Samuel Paquette/Petar Teodorovic (C) – 6-1

SINGLES
1 – #80 Radu Papoe (C) def. E. Graziani (P) -- 6-3, 6-3
2 – Zhu (P) def. Vladislav Melnic (C) -- 6-4, 6-2
3 – Gupta (P) def.  Petar Teodorovic (C) – 6-1, 6-3
4 – Parikh (P) def. Adit Sinha (C) – 6-3, 3-6, 7-6 [9]
5 – Nathan Mao (C) def. M. Graziani (P) – 6-3, 6-2
6 – Aman Sharma (C) def. Baylor Sai (P) – 6-4, 6-2