ITHACA, N.Y. – The men's tennis team opens the home portion of its dual match season on Sunday, when it hosts a pair of non-league matches against Iowa at 11 a.m. and Colgate at 3 p.m. at Reis Tennis Center.
 
Cornell (3-5) is coming off a fifth-place finish at the ECAC Indoor Championships last weekend in Philadelphia. Continuing to compete with a limited lineup, the Big Red was defeated by host Penn in Friday's quarterfinals, 4-0, before rebounding in the consolation round with a 4-2 win over Brown on Sunday. Junior Daniel Soyfer teamed with senior Jake Hansen to lock up the doubles point at the No. 2 position, then he went on to secure the clinching point in singles play by prevailing in a second-set tiebreaker at No. 3.
 
That victory pushes Soyfer's singles record to 4-4, which puts him in a tie for the team lead in victories with junior Lev Kazakov (4-3 from the top two positions). Senior David Volfson is now ranked 18th nationally in singles, and is 29th alongside Soyfer in doubles – but he has yet to compete in a dual match due to injury. Sophomore Alafia Ayeni is 2-3 from No. 1 singles in his stead, and he's 3-2 when competing with sophomore Eero Vasa at the top spot in singles.
 
In the first week of the Intercollegiate Tennis Association using its computerized ranking system, Iowa appears at 42nd in the country. The Hawkeyes are off to an 8-1 start, including an active three-match winning streak following victories of 4-3 over UMKC and 5-2 over Omaha last Friday. Iowa's lone loss so far came Feb. 8 at home against Miami, which is now ranked 35th in the country. Kareem Allaf is 6-3 from the top positions in singles, having spent some time in the national rankings earlier this year. Oliver Okonkwo, Will Davies and Piotr Smietana are also 7-2 from further down the order, and Iowa has won the doubles point in eight of its nine matches.
 
Cornell leads the all-time series against Iowa, 3-2, thanks to a 4-3 victory last year at Iowa. Hansen and Kazakov won in a tiebreaker at No. 1 doubles to secure the match's opening point, then Ayeni clinched the match with a three-set victory at No. 2 singles. Sunday's match will mark the fourth time the teams have met in the last five years.
 
The weekend concludes with a match against Colgate (3-4), which opens the weekend at home against Youngstown State. Cornell is 56-16-3 all-time against Colgate, with Sunday's 76th all-time meeting between the programs marking the most for Cornell against a non-Ivy League opponent in its history. The teams last clashed two years ago, with the Big Red emerging with a 7-0 victory.