No. 1 Pirates Lead No. 6 HPU, 2-1, After Doubles

The NCAA Division II Men's Tennis semifinals are underway with more high drama as the No. 1-ranked Pirates have taken a 2-1 lead over No. 6 Hawaii Pacific.

Doubles play began with the Pirates taking an early break in all three matches. Rafael Array and Tim Johannsen closed out an 8-4 win over Hendrik Bode and Sebastian Bader at No. 2 doubles to give AASU a point. But the HPU team of Aleksandar Markov and Anton Samuilau erased a 7-4 deficit to pick up a 9-7 win over Eudaldo Bonet and Akos Torok at No. 3 doubles.

That threw all the attention at No. 1 singles, where fifth-ranked Paul Bishop and Mikk Irdoja (pictured) fought off two match points during a tiebreaker to take the match and a pivotal point, 9-8 (9-7). AASU now leads HPU, 2-1, heading into singles play.

In the other national semifinal, a mild shocker as No. 12 Concordia (N.Y.) leads No. 2 Barry, 2-1, after doubles. Those doubles matches finished earlier than ours, so at the end of our No. 1 doubles matches, we had quite the crowd checking out the match - including members from both Concordia and Barry.