HANOVER, N.H. — The No. 14-ranked Harvard men's tennis team handed the Cornell men's tennis team its first loss of the spring season in the semifinals of the ECAC Indoor Championships on Saturday afternoon.

Cornell, who entered the contest with wins in its first seven games of the spring slate, claimed the opening point with a pair of doubles victories. Sophomore Radu Papoe and senior Vladislav Melnic won 6-3 at the No. 2 position and freshman Petar Teodorovic and junior Samuel Paquette edged Harris Walker and David Lins in a tiebreak 7-6 (8).

Singles action was all Harvard as the Crimson recorded victories in the first four matches to conclude, aiding the nationally-ranked program to a berth in the championship game with No. 2-seeded Columbia.

Henry von der Schulenberg and Daniel Milavsky had straight-set victories, respectively, at the No. 2 and No. 3 positions to put Harvard ahead of the Big Red. Valdemar Pape and Steven Sun won in three sets to solidify the Crimson's match win.

Paquette defeated Pape in the first set, 6-0, but the Danish native claimed the next two sets, 6-3, 6-4, to further increase Harvard's lead.

Just like Paquette, sophomore Nathan Mao also won the first set of his match against Sun, 6-2, but the Harvard senior also won the next two sets by 6-4, 6-3 scores.

Fellow sophomores Radu Papoe and Adit Sinha each were playing in the third set of each of their matches when play was halted after the match result was solidifed.

Looking Ahead

Cornell will play third-seeded Penn in the third-place game at noon on Sunday at the Boss Tennis Center.

Scouting Penn

Penn enters Sunday's match with a 4-3 overall record on the season after falling to No. 19-ranked Columbia, 4-1, on Saturday. Just like Cornell, the Quakers claimed the doubles point against the Lions before Columbia cruised with four singles victories.

The other loss surrendered by the Quakers so far this year came to No. 8-ranked South Carolina, 4-0, on Jan. 28, and 4-3 to VCU on Jan. 29. 

Senior Edoardo Graziani currently is ranked No. 52 in the ITA's most recent singles rankings.