LAKE NONA, FL – After winning the ITA National Team Indoor Championships each of the past two seasons, Case Western Reserve has checked off another program first at this year’s NCAA Division III Men’s Tennis Championship, beating Tufts to win the program’s first NCAA Championship.
Coming in as the top seed in the tournament, Case Western Reserve continued its dominant run at the Division III level this year, finishing 33-4 and avenging their 2021 and 2022 NCAA Runner-Up finishes.
Begging with doubles, Case jumped out to a dominating 3-0 lead after they won across all three doubles positions. Courts one and two each had 8-3 decisions in favor of the Spartans, while court three finished 8-6 as Case now only needed just two singles wins to reach a new height for their program.
In singles play, Tufts began to make its push, fighting hard across all courts to make the match much more highly-contested after Case swept the doubles points.
Trading straight-set wins on courts four, five, and six, the score was quickly drawn to 4-2 in favor of the Spartans with all sights now turned to court one where senior James Hopper was looking to close out the match and the championship with a straight-set win.
Riding the wave of energy from the crowd and his teammates, Hopper was able to finish out his match 6-4, 6-4 to begin the celebrations for Case Western Reserve and head coach Todd Wojtkowski who reaches the pinnacle of college tennis for the first time in his coaching career after being so close these past two seasons.
This National Championship not only marks the first in program history for Case Western Reserve but also the first in athletics history which dates back over a century.
For complete match results continue reading below:
Match Summary
Doubles:
- #1 James Hopper/Vishwa Aduru (CWRU) def. #2 Derin Acaroglu/Vuk Vuksanovic (TUFTS) 8-3
- Chris Provenzano/Diego Maza (CWRU) def. Josh Belandres/Rishabh Sharda (TUFTS) 8-3
- Sahil Dayal/Ansh Shah (CWRU) def. Alex Ganchev/Jack Moldenhauer (TUFTS) 8-6
Singles:
- #34 James Hopper (CWRU) def. Rishabh Sharda (TUFTS) 6-4, 6-4
- #40 Vishwa Aduru (CWRU) vs. Vuk Vuksanovic (TUFTS) 6-4, 4-6, 1-1, unfinished
- Michael Sutanto (CWRU) vs. #44 Alex Ganchev (TUFTS) 4-6, 4-5, unfinished
- #24 Derin Acaroglu (TUFTS) def. #18 Ansh Shah (CWRU) 6-2, 6-2
- Ajay Mahenthiran (CWRU) def. Javier Gonzalez (TUFTS) 6-1, 6-2
- Andrej Djokic (TUFTS) def. Casey Hishinuma (CWRU) 6-3, 7-6
