Oct. 23, 2011

EVANSTON, Ill. - The Illinois State men's tennis team concluded their fall season after completing the final day of the Northwestern Invitational at the Combe Tennis Center Sunday. The `Birds won 2-of-4 matches.

Jusso Ojanen beat Pablo Olivarez of Western Michigan, 6-4, 6-4 while Muddappa Appanervanda defeated Iowa's Andres Estenssoro, 6-3, 6-4.

Head Coach Cris James was impressed by Ojanen and Appanervanda.

"Jusso continued to play tough and outlasted his competition," said James. "Muddappa came out and dominated. He played really well. I liked that he played in control and acted like the better player."

Not as fortunate in singles play were Jacob Wilson, who lost to Nicholas Wong of Toledo, 6-4, 6-4 and Willi Peter, who was defeated by DePaul's Adam Reinhart, 6-2, 6-7, 10-5.

"I wanted Jacob and Willi to play with a little more confidence, especially in the beginning of their matches," said James. "They started to fight for the win near the end of their matches but they just couldn't get it done."

James is pleased with his team's progress in their fall season.

"Generally, I'm pretty happy with how our fall season went," said James. "Every guy on the team learned some things that they need to work on. A couple guys have been really consistent and a couple guys need to get more consistent. I know we still have a long way to go for us to be where we want to be but I think we made progress."

The `Birds will continue to work hard in hopes of achieving their goals for the spring season.

"We will continue to work on our fitness as well as spend some significant time on doubles to try to get that where it needs to be," said James. "We will be doing a lot of individual work too, continuing to add things to each of the guys' game and fix some problem areas. We want to try to be nationally ranked. With our team being so young, we really just need to stay focused on continuing to get better. If we do that, hopefully most of our goals will be achieved."

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