April 2, 2006
Results
"I know we've got a tough squad, but getting these injuries at this time of year would be hard on anyone," commented coach Thomas Colvin. His Bulldog Tennis team traveled short-handed to Houston, Tex., for the East vs. West Round-robin. In the first match, just as in the ladies match, the injury bug hit.
"I didn't see what happened," Colvin said. "I just looked back at the baseline and he was down."
The `he' was senior captain Willis Mbandi who had suffered a slight groin pull. While he did continue to play, he wasn't able to play at his normal level. The Bulldogs lost the doubles point and managed only 1 singles win in their match against Prairie View, falling 1-6. The second match of the day was against a strong team from Texas Southern University. Against the extremely tough Tigers, the Bulldogs did manage a few bright spots, but fell 0-7.
On day 2, the Bulldogs started the day against the University of Arkansas-Pine Bluff without their senior leader. The Bulldogs responded with a 7-0 win and some motivation heading into the second match against Southern University.
"Without Willis and Adande, we really had to create some doubles match-ups," Colvin said. "We went the remainder of the round-robin with some doubles teams who had never so much as practiced together."
But, it seemed to work. The Bulldogs responded by winning the doubles point against the Jaguars; however, there wasn't enough `pop' in the lineup to pull out the needed 3 singles wins. Only 2 wins in singles left the Bulldogs with a 3-4 loss.
In the final match, the Bulldogs lined up on probably the warmest of the 3 days against Grambling State University, the team that the Bulldogs will face in the first round of the SWAC Championships. Shingie Nyagura, Arda Kaytan and Cardinas Campbell got 3 wins in singles, but it turned out to be 1 shy of a win.
"Losing 2 seniors from your lineup is hard to overcome," Colvin said. "I just hope that we can have them ready for the championships in a couple of weeks. We will need them."
