BETHLEHEM, Pa. – The Monmouth University men's tennis team fell to Lehigh, 4-3, Sunday afternoon in non-conference action at the Lewis Tennis Center. The Hawks, who received points from a pair of newcomers in Przemyslaw Filipek (Bedzin, Poland/Second Lo) and Luke Adamus (Mosmoan, New South Whales/Redlands) along with Christian Vieira (Houston, Texas/Memorial), fall to 0-2 on the year, while the Mountain Hawks improve to a 2-0 in dual matches.

"This was a great college match and I am very proud of the way we competed,” commented head coach Cory Hubbard. “We have a young group that is just learning what it means to be a team and play together and play for each other. We played a team that made the NCAA tournament last year and returned five players and we hung with them until the last match.”

Despite being down 1-0 after doubles play, Adamus opened up singles action by earning his first victory in a MU uniform by downing Tyler Hansen 6-2, 6-3 at No. 3 singles. Filipek, slated in the No. 1 slot, earned his first Monmouth win with a 6-3, 5-6, 6-5 (3) victory over his counterpart Ben Gilman. Vieira held of Timur Chernykh 6-2, 6-3, 10-3 at No. 5 singles, but Lehigh sealed the victory by earning wins at No. 4 and No. 6.

Hubbard added, "The last two seasons we have lost to Lehigh 7-0 and won just one set. We lost 4-3 today, but we were missing one of our top players, Victor Pugliese. We will have a lot of these close 4-3 matches so if we keep believing and competing then we will eventually succeed."

Monmouth returns to action this Saturday, February 1st against Army. First serve from West Point, N.Y. is scheduled for 2 p.m.

Tennis Match Results
Monmouth vs Lehigh
Jan 26, 2014 at Bethlehem, Pa.

Lehigh 4, Monmouth 3

Singles competition
1. Filipek, Przemyslaw (MU) def. Gilman, Ben (LEHIGH) 6-3, 5-6, 6-5 (7-3)
2. Petersen, Mitchell (LEHIGH) def. Marcinkowski, Freddy (MU) 6-3, 6-1
3. Adamus, Luke (MU) def. Hansen, Tyler (LEHIGH) 6-2, 6-3
4. Kochman, Jeremy (LEHIGH) def. Bekhiet, Ramy (MU) 6-4, 3-6, 6-5 (8-6)
5. Vieira, Christian (MU) def. Chernykh, Timur (LEHIGH) 6-2, 3-6, 10-3
6. Bogard, Ethan (LEHIGH) def. Prezant, Jason (MU) 6-2, 6-1

Doubles competition
1. Petersen, Mitchell/Goldberg, Mark (LEHIGH) def. Filipek, Przemyslaw/Vieira, Christian (MU) 6-2
2. Gilman, Ben/Kochman, Jeremy (LEHIGH) def. Kumthonkittikul, Bee/Adamus, Luke (MU) 6-2
3. Bogard, Ethan/Chernykh, Timur (LEHIGH) vs. Bekhiet, Ramy/Marcinkowski, Freddy (MU) 3-5, unfinished