CAMBRIDGE, Mass. -- The Cornell men's tennis team kicked off its 2025-26 season with a strong showing at Harvard's annual Chowderfest, highlighted by sophomore Rodrigo Fernandes' perfect 6-0 weekend. 

Fernandes led the way for the Big Red in Cambridge, notching singles wins over Sasha Colleu (Illinois), Rohan Murali (Harvard), and Benjamin Privara (Harvard), all in straight sets. His 3-0 mark in singles was matched by his perfect teaming with freshman Rethin Pranav Senthil Kumar, sweeping through the weekend at 3-0. The squad combined for two wins over Harvard tandems, then took down Illinois' Colleu and Jeremy Zhang, 7-5.

Freshman Nathan Gold started his collegiate career with a bang, going 3-0 in singles, including a straight-sets decision over Harvard's James MacDonald and a gritty three-set battle with Vikas Deo of SMU. He and Petar Teodorovic went 1-2 in doubles, highlighted by a win against Yale's Eric Li and Edward Liao. Teodorovic and Senthil Kumar also added a pair of singles victories over the weekend.

"Our goal this weekend was to test ourselves against high-level competition and come away with lessons - and I believe we accomplished exactly that," said Silviu Tanasiou, the Savitt-Weiss Head Coach of Men's Tennis. "From Rodrigo Fernandes going undefeated in singles and doubles, to strong steps forward by our freshmen like Kumar and solid performances from veterans like Petar and Nathan, there were a lot of encouraging signs to build on moving forward."

The Big Red collected a total of 11 singles wins and five doubles victories across three days of play. The event featured teams from Boston University,  Brown, Illinois, SMU, Yale and Cornell.

Cornell will be back in action beginning Friday, Sept. 26 when team members compete at the Yale Invitational in New Haven, Conn.