MURFREESBORO, Tenn. -- A battle in the Volunteer State favored the Big Red on Tuesday, as Cornell men's tennis took down No. 26 Middle Tennessee State, 4-2, to close out its six-match road trip. Cornell improved to 7-3 on the year, whiile Middle Tennessee fell to 9-6.

An early battle for momentum started in doubles as Middle Tennessee picked up a 6-4 win in No. 3 doubles from Karim Al-Amin and Marcel Kamrowksi over Samuel Paquette and Radu Papoe. Eric Verdes and Petar Teodorovic countered, earning their second straight victory as a duo with a 6-4 victory at the No. 2 position over Javier Cueto Ramos and Shu Matsuoka to make the battle at the No. 1 position the decider for the first point. Nathan Mao and Adit Sinha battled hard, pushing the match into a tiebreaker after tying things up at 6-6. But Leo Raquin and Ondrej Horak pulled away in the decider, winning 7-3 to catapult the Blue Raiders to a 1-0 lead heading into singles action.

Bradley Paliska put the Big Red in the win column to open singles, taking a 6-4, 6-3 victory from the No. 4 position to tie the scoring at one apiece. The win also snapped a two-match losing streak for the senior. Middle Tennessee countered immediately thanks to Shu Matsuoka, who took a 6-4, 7-5 decision over Paquette at No. 6 singles to push the Blue Raiders back ahead, 2-1.

Cornell would find the momentum shift back into its favor in the most intense match of the day between Sinha and Marcel Kamrowski at No. 2 singles. Sinha, who came into Tuesday on a two-match winning streak, rallied to push the opening set into a tiebreaker. And after falling behind 2-0, the junior flipped the switch, taking a 7-5 victory to take the opening set and put the pressure on Kamrowski, who came into the day as the No. 107 ranked singles player in the latest ITA rankings. And with all the momentum on his side, Sinha slammed the door shut of any comeback attempt for Kamrowski, earning a 7-5 victory to pull the upset and secure his third straight victory.

With the score now knotted at two apiece, it was time to see if the Big Red or the Blue Raiders would grab the lead back and be within one point of clinching the victory. That honor fell on the shoulders of sophomore Petar Teodorovic, who snagged a straight sets win over Ondrej Horak (6-4, 7-6 (7-4)) to put Cornell up for the first time in the match, 3-2.

Only one point stood in the way of pulling off the upset for the Big Red, as either Radu Papoe (No. 1 singles) or Felipe Pinzon (No. 5 singles) needed to secure a win in the final two matches of the day. Papoe, who was coming off his first loss of the spring season to unranked Alex Martinez of Oklahoma on Sunday, was looking for a rebound match against No. 33 Leo Raquin. But after Papoe failed to win the opening set, it looked like Pinzon would need to play hero again for the Big Red. However, the junior captain stayed the course, putting the hammer down by winning consecutive sets to secure the victory in the first matchup between Cornell and Middle Tennessee since 2014.

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Cornell will finally return home for the first time since Jan. 28, welcoming #50 Southern Methodist University (noon) and Hobart College (5 p.m.) on Saturday, March 2nd from the Reis Tennis Center.