SARATOGA SPRINGS, NY – The University of Rochester men's tennis team secured six wins across singles and doubles play during the opening day of action at the ITA Northeast Regional Championships at Skidmore College on Friday.
 
Junior Ziwen Ju is the lone Yellowjacket player to still be alive in the main draw of competition that features two draws in both singles and doubles play.
 
Ju earned a pair of victories in the main draw of the singles bracket and added another win during the main draw in doubles with teammate Ethan Samora.
 
During the days action, Ju, a 9-16 seeded player in the bracket, defeated Farmingdale State's Michael Lerman 6-0, 6-0 in the opening round. In the second round Ju faced a tougher match, battling with NYU's Boris Slesarev. Ju ultimately won that on 6-4, 4-6 and 10-4. In the third round, he will battle top-8 seeded Yuval Goodman of Skidmore College.
 
In doubles, Ju and Samore posted a thrilling 8-7 (7-3) win over Simon Philip and Arhan Gupta from Union College in the opening round. During the next match, the UR pair battled top-8 seeded Alexei Katelvsky and Filip Glov Moeller of Hamilton, eventually falling by an 8-2 score.
 
Also in the main draw of the singles competition, URochester's Andy Liu was seeded in the top-16 and secured an opening round win against Vassar's Junchen Jia. Liu won 6-1, 4-6, 13-11 in round one, but battled and fell in another tight 3-set match in round two to Hobart's Dylan Ortiz. In that matchup, Ortiz emerged victorious by a 6-3, 2-6, 10-3 score.
 
A.J. Balsamo ended up earned two of Rochester's other wins on the day, both coming in consolation matches. Balsamo dropped his opening round 'B' draw singles match to Kenn Wijesekara of NYU 3-6, 6-4, 1-10, but rebounded for a win in his next match, dispatching Oneonta's Peter Pitaleff 8-2 in the consolation round.
 
During doubles play, Balsamo and Liam Rieger fell 8-2 to Trent Sauer and Evan Ly in the 'B' draw first round. In their first consolation match, Balsamo and Rieger blanked Pitaleff and Ryan Geller of Oneonta 8-0 to advance.
 
URochester's other win during Friday's matches were from Josh Chu and Kaiser Zhao in the main draw doubles consolation. After falling 8-1 to top-8 seeded Jesus Alberto and Solen Bellemare of Union, Chu and Zhao responded with an 8-3 win against Luka Plana and Emil Sabovic of Farmingdale State.
 
Others in action for the Yellowjackets were singles main draw entrants in Samora, Zhao and Alan Wang. Each dropped two matches on the day, ending their tournament runs.
 
Samora fell 6-1, 6-1 to Maciej Zarebski of NYU in the main draw and then was defeated 8-2 by Skidmore's Alton Swan in the consolation. Zhao was defeated 3-6, 6-7 (4) in a match versus Bryan Hui of NYU in the opening round before falling 8-7 (4) to Baruch's Juan Mendoza in his next contest. Wang, meanwhile, dropped a 1-6, 7-5, 9-11 decision in the opening round to TNCJ's Aidan Twamley before getting upended by Hobart's Achilleas Kousaridis 8-2 in the consolation bracket.