CEDAR RAPIDS, IA     Despite rainy conditions, the Buena Vista Men's Tennis team found time between the rain to compete in the American Rivers Conference Singles and Doubles Championships over the weekend in Cedar Rapids Iowa.  The event hosted by NWU, was played at Coe College and Vets Courts when weather permitted outdoors, and indoors at Coe College when the courts were too wet to play. 

The tournament kicked off Friday morning with both Doubles teams for BVU on the court competing in the B Doubles Draw.  First up was Brock Bruns and Dalton Pregon taking on a duo from Wartburg.  Playing some of their best tennis together, the pair earned a hard fought tie-break battle 8-7(7-4).  This was the first win for Bruns and Pregon together this fall.  Shorly after that match took the court, Beavers Ryan Webb and Ben Austin went to the courts against COE College and picked up and equally tough tie-break win 8-7(7-4).  Following the morning wins, the two teams each drew Loras College teams in the second round.  With almost identical scores again, the pairs fell to the Du-Hawks 5-8 and 4-8.  "I was extremely happy with how Doubles started out for us, getting two wins in thrilling fashion is always a great way to get going," Coach Groen lamented.  

Just before the Singles draws were set to start, the rains came in and washed away most of the Friday afternoon matches as play was moved indoors to Coe College.  As the day wore on, changes were made to the schedule, and Friday's singles matches would get moved to Saturday and the format would be shortened to 8 game pro-sets, less tennis than the normal 2 out of 3 sets.  

In B Singles, Pregon would take the court first against Wartburg and fall late after keeping up early at 2 all.  "The style of play that Dalton's opponent used was hard for him to adjust to and even though things were tight early, Wartburg just outlasted him," Groen continued.  Bruns would follow quickly on the court with a first round match up against an always tough Luther opponent.  Like Pregon, Bruns started strong keeping pace at 2-2, before Luther ran off 6 straight games for the 8-2 win.  In C SIngles competition, the Beavers put Webb and Austin to the test.  Ryan Webb took the court first against Wartburg's Flenker, falling 1-8 to the brackets eventual Champion.  "Ryan's opponent had an all out aggressive yet unique style and it cause issues early that we weren't able to overcome, but it worked all day for him as he was the champion," Groen said. Ben Austin was the last on the courts for BVU, as his first round match up was against Central College. Never having the match seperated by more than a game the entire match, Austin went into yet another tie-break. Despite having 3 match points at different times, Austin was unable to capitalize on the chances before dropping the final two points of the tie-break 6-8.

The Beavers have now wrapped up the fall season and will resume tennis again in January of 2023 for their main Spring season.