Oct. 19, 2012

CHARLOTTESVILLE, Va. - Saint Joseph's men's tennis senior Alex Veronis cruised into the second round of the main singles draw at the 2012 ITA Atlantic Regional Championships on Friday afternoon at the University of Virginia.

Dan Barrus and Tommy Gates also reached the second round, winning their first round doubles match over a duo from Longwood, 8-6. The Hawk pair will face the top-seeded pairing from Virginia in the Round of 32 on Saturday.¬¬¬

Three other Hawk duos were eliminated from the draw: Veronis and Jose Sierra fell to a duo from William & Mary, 8-5; Jeff Kessler and Pierre Brondeau went down to a Virginia squad, 8-6; and Max Montague and Andres Urrea fell to a pair from Penn State, 8-1.

In singles play, Veronis moved into the second round with a 6-2, 6-0 win over James Madison's Maxi Branth.

Gates lost in the first round to Scott Huang of William & Mary, 6-2, 6-1, while Brondeau went down to Dante Terenzio of Old Dominion by the same score. Sierra fell in three sets to Greg Vladimirsky of James Madison, 4-6, 7-6, 6-3, while Barrus was a 6-1, 7-5 victim of Delaware's Adam Lawton and Urrea went down to Roman Trkulja of Penn State, 6-3, 6-2.