NEWPORT NEWS, Va. -- Playing in their final home regular season match against a Division III opponent, three Christopher Newport senior men's tennis players contributed to an 8-1 win over Salisbury University on Saturday afternoon at the Eyre Courts. Paul Baron, Mason Kolls, and Ryan Macy helped lead the way for the 40th-ranked Captains as they cruised past the Coast-To-Coast Athletic Conference foes on a cool, sunny afternoon in Newport News. 

The Captains bounced back after dropping three straight to nationally-ranked opponents and improved to 8-7 overall on the season. The setback drops Salisbury back to .500 on the season with a 7-7 overall record. 

The senior tandem of Baron and Kolls got the Captains' rolling with an 8-5 win at No. 2 doubles over Christopher Catan and Mitchell Desman. The Captains escaped doubles with a 2-1 advantage after Ashton Legum and Ahun Vodela paired up for an 8-6 win at No. 3 over Gavin Reagle and Russell Willenborg. 

The lone loss in doubles, which would prove to be the only loss of the day for CNU, came in extra time at No. 1. Ryan Macy and Alec Strause battled shot for shot against Gianluca Beaujon and Brad Pappalardo before the teams were knotted at 7-7 and forced into a tiebreaker. Even there, the two pairings went into extra shots before the Sea Gulls eeked out an 8-7 (9-7) win over the CNU pair. 

With a 2-1 advantage in singles, the Captains raced away from their conference foes with wins in all six individual matches. Kolls capped a terrific senior day performance with a straight set win at No. 6 over Jhayden Pappas for a two-win day. He finished off Pappas with a 7-5, 6-1 final. Vodela and Legum also added two win performances as Vodela dropped Catan (6-1, 6-1) at No. 4 and Legum earned a win over Reagle at No. 5 (6-4, 6-3). 

Eddy Porsmyr Hansen had the most dominant singles victory for the Captains without surrendering a game to Willenborg (6-0, 6-0). Alec Strause was also exceptional in singles, dropping Beaujon in straight sets (6-3, 6-0). 

The most entertaining match of the game came for senior Ryan Macy against Pappalardo on the top line. Looking to salvage Senior Day after a tough loss in doubles, Macy split the first two sets by identical scores of 6-3. In the third set, he trailed 4-0 to Pappalardo before staging an exciting come-from-behind effort for the win. Macy made it a clean sweep in singles for CNU with a 6-3, 3-6, 1-0 (12-10) win over Pappalardo. 

The Captains will face Hampton University at home on Tuesday, April 12 at 3:00 pm in their final home match before traveling to Baltimore to face Haverford College on Saturday, April 23 at 1:00 pm to close the regular season on a neutral court.