This weekend, the men’s tennis team opened its season by hosting the Columbia Classic at the Dick Savitt Tennis Center. After three days of play, Harvard took the “A” singles title, while Cornell won the “A” doubles championship. Nevertheless, Columbia had a strong showing at its tournament in multiple categories.

Two Harvard teammates faced off in the final round of “A” singles. One of them, Sasha Ermakov, overtook Columbia sophomore Jonathan Wong in the semifinals to get to that point. Wong, seeded eighth, was the only Columbia player of three in the “A” quarterfinals to get past that round and did so with an upset of the tournament’s top seed—Harvard’s Dan Nguyen, who fell in three sets to Wong, losing the first and third sets by scores of 7-5 and 6-0, respectively.

Columbia senior Mark Clemente, seeded third in “A” singles, did not have as much success as his teammate. After beating Manhattan College’s Mihai Nichifor, Clemente was stopped by Ermakov in three sets in the quarterfinals. He took the first set, but could not take the match, as Ermakov won the final two sets, 6-2, 6-2. Columbia junior Bogdan Borta beat Christian Coley of Marist in the first round, but also lost in three sets in the quarterfinals.

In “B” singles, Columbia freshman Sho Matsumoto reached the round of 16 and freshman Kevin Kung got to the quarterfinals, where he lost to an unseeded player.

Columbia junior Dan Urban emerged victorious in the “C” singles competition. The third seed plowed through his first two matches, winning the first 6-1, 6-2 and the second 6-3, 6-2. Urban continued to shine in the semifinals, as he beat Cornell’s Jeremy Feldman, seeded second, for the 6-4, 6-2 upset. This win led him to the championship round, where he overtook Nicolas Pisecky, the fourth seed from Marist, for the title. Urban won the first set, 6-4, and was up 2-0 in the second when Pisecky withdrew.

Clemente and Wong, the fourth seed in “A” doubles, beat Yale’s tandem of Connor Dawson and Mike Caldwell in the quarterfinals, but then withdrew. Columbia’s second-seeded pair, Borta and senior Justin Chow, fell in the quarterfinals to Yale’s unseeded Josh Lederman and Calvin Bennett.

The Lions continue their homestand this weekend, as they host Binghamton Friday at 2