DAYTONA BEACH, Fla. – The Embry-Riddle and Flagler men's tennis teams battled for a little over four hours at the Crotty Tennis Complex on Thursday and, in the end, it was the 11th-ranked Saints that pulled out a 5-4 win over the 10th-ranked Eagles. The Saints won one doubles and four singles matches to improve to 4-2 on the year, while the Eagles move to 2-2 with the loss.
 
Lucas Lesoeur and Deepak Vishavkarma earned the Eagles' first point of the day with an 8-4 win over Lucas Bolla and Rasmus Jonsson at the third doubles position. At No. 2 doubles, Juan Ortiz Couder and Lucas Bos took a 4-1 lead over Felipe Carvalho and Daniel Arrien. The Flagler pair recorded a hold and a break to cut the lead to one game, but the Eagles answered with a hold and a break of their own on the way to an 8-6 win to put the Blue and Gold up 2-0.
 
The top doubles spot saw Lucas Storck and Konstantin Dustmann upend Rodolfo Arreygue and Andres Donayre 8-6 to make the score 2-1 heading into singles.
 
The first singles point went to Jonsson who bested Lesoeur 6-1, 6-0 on court six to tie the team score at 2-2.
 
Bos broke the deadlock with a 6-1, 6-0 defeat of Herman Gertmann at the fifth position, and Donayre made it 4-2 in favor of the Eagles with his 7-6 (9-7), 6-2 win over Dustmann at No. 3 singles.
 
The final three matches all need three sets to determine the outcome. The Eagles won the first sets on courts one and four, but Alex Chepile bested Arreygue 3-6, 6-4, 6-3 at No. 4 and Bolla held off Ortiz Couder 1-6, 6-3, 6-3 at No. 1 to knot the match at 4-4.
 
The final match off the court saw Storck edge Vishavkarma 7-6 (3) in the first set at No. 2 singles, but the ERAU senior battle back to take the second 6-2. The decisive third set went to Stork who topped Vishavkarma 6-2 to clinch the win for Flagler.
 
The Eagles will scrimmage Bethune Cookman on Feb. 22 before taking on top-ranked West Florida at 11 a.m. on Feb. 24.