MATCH CENTRAL
NAIA No. 2 Embry-Riddle (4-1) vs. NCAA II No. 14 Saint Leo (4-1)
DATE: Thursday, Feb. 26, 2015
CITY: Saint Leo, Fla.
SITE: Saint Leo Tennis Center
TIME: 3 p.m.
SERIES: SLU leads 16-3
LAST MEETING: Barry def. ERAU 9-0 on Feb. 9,  2014

FIRST SERVE
• Embry-Riddle is in its 27th season of competition
• Deni Zmak and Jaime Sanchez-Canamares Rios are ranked No. 1 doubles team in the country, and Zmak is ranked No. 1in singles
• Head Coach Dave Paschal is in his 11th season as the Eagles' head coach.
• Embry-Riddle and Saint Leo are meeting in men's tennis for the 20th time

ABOUT THE EAGLES
The Eagles are looking to bounce back from a tough loss to Barry last Saturday. The Eagles got an exciting 9-8 wi at the No. 2 spot, but trailed the third-ranked Buccaneers 2-1 heading into singles. Deni Zmak notched a straight set win at No. 1 singles and Rodolfo Arreygue earned a come-from-behind three-set victory at the sixth spot, but Barry took the remaining singles matched to win the contest 6-3.
 
Ranked No. 2 in the latest NAIA Men's Tennis Coaches Top 25 poll, the Eagles are 4-1 on the year. Zmak leads the Eagles with 16 singles wins and hast teamed up with Jaime Sanchez-Canamares for 15 wins in doubles play. Arreygue is undefeated in singles at 8-0 on the year.

ABOUT THE LIONS
Saint Leo also brings a 4-1 record into Thursday's game. Ranked 14^th in the NCAA II national preseason poll, the Lions' resume include a 5-4 upset of third-ranked Lynn on Feb. 15. Saint Leo returns three individuals from last season's 18-5 squad.

THE ERAU-SLU SERIES
Embry-Riddle and Saint Leo have faced each other 19 times. The Lions hold a 15-3 advantage in the series, including last season's 5-4 edge over the Blue and Gold.

The Last Meeting
The Embry-Riddle men's tennis team dropped a tough 5-4 decision against Saint Leo on March 26, 2014.  Five of the matches in the four-hour, 40-minute contest required extra play to determine the outcome and the Lions managed to hold on for wins in four of those contests to improve to 14-3 on the year, while the Eagles moved to 10-3.
 
The Eagles started off strong but ended doubles competition down 2-1. The No. 1 doubles team of Deni Zmak and Simon Felix defeated Saint Leo's Bruno Sisti and Aloua Adjenak 8-3 to lead off the scoring and put the Eagles up 1-0.
 
On court two, Jaime Sanchez-Canamares Rios and Patrick Besch engaged in a back-and-forth battle with Matt Nicholson-Lewis and Victor Lozier, but eventually fell in a tiebreaker 9-8 (7-5).
 
The match on court three also required a tiebreaker to decide the result and in the end it was Ismail Lemtouni and Fons Verberne who managed to outlast ERAU's Miguel Lopez-Gomez and Luke de Caires 9-8 with an 8-6 decision in the tiebreaker.
 
Zmak made the score 2-2 when he dispatched Adjenak 6-1, 6-2 at the top singles spot. Felix gave the Eagles the 3-2 lead with his 6-1, 6-1 defeat of Oskar Nurmio on court three, but Jacobo Gonzalez-Tarrio tied things up again with a 6-0, 6-3 decision against Lopez Gomez at the fifth position.
 
The contest at No. 4 singles needed three sets to determine the outcome and, in the end, it was Lozier who emerged with a 6-1, 2-6, 7-5 win over Besch to reclaim the lead for the Lions.
 
Competing in the longest singles match of the day, Sanchez-Canamares fell just short of a win in the first set, falling 7-5 to Nicholson-Lewis, but the ERAU junior battled back to claim the second by the same score and force a third set. With the score tied at 3-3, Sanchez-Canamares bested the Lion senior in each of the next three games to win 6-3 and tie the team score again.
 
The deciding match was on court six where de Caires took an early lead with a 6-2 decision in the first set against Verberne, brother of ERAU's Juan Verberne. The ERAU freshman was unable to maintain the advantage, however, and dropped the next two sets 6-2, 6-2 to give SLU the win.


BY THE NUMBERS
348 - All-time wins in ERAU Men's Tennis history
200 - Eagle victories under guidance of Head Coach Dave Paschal
72 - Conference wins in program history
15 - NAIA National Tournament appearances
11 - Seasons of competition with Dave Paschal at the helm
11 - Regular season conference championships
7 – Individual singles national titles
6 – Conference tournament titles
4 – Individual doubles national titles
1 – NAIA National team title

EAGLES IN THE RANKINGS
The Eagles are ranked No. 2 in the NAIA Men's Tennis Coaches' Top 25 poll, marking the 10th consecutive season that ERAU Men's Tennis is ranked among the nation's top five. The Eagles have three student-athletes ranked among the nation's Top 50, including No. 1 Deni Zmak and No. 15 Jaime Sanchez-Canamares Rios. Zmak and Felix also comprise the top-ranked doubles team in the nation while Miguel Lopez Gomez and Luke de Caires are ranked 24th.