Owls to take on Tigers in NCAC semifinal

GAMBIER, Ohio -- Following Friday's first-round results, the Kenyon College men's tennis team found out it will be battling the DePauw University Tigers in Saturday's semifinal round of the six-team 2025 North Coast Athletic Conference (NCAC) Tournament.

DePauw, the tournament's No. 3 seed, knocked off No. 6-seeded Ohio Wesleyan University by a 4-0 final on Friday. That moved the unranked Tigers, with a 16-7 overall record, into the semifinal against No. 2-seeded Kenyon. The Owls, owners of a 17-4 record, are ranked No. 13 nationally by the Intercollegiate Tennis Association (ITA).

The winner of Saturday's semifinal, slated for a 1:30 p.m. start, will move to Sunday's championship match to face the winner of Saturday's other semifinal match between No. 4 seed Wabash College and No. 1 seed Denison University.

Sunday's championship match has a noon start and will be played in Granville, Ohio. Since Denison won the NCAC regular season title, the Big Red gained the tournament's No.1 seed and the right to host all tournament matches.

During this past regular season, Kenyon traveled to DePauw and pulled out a close 4-3 victory. The Tigers swept all three doubles matches to gain one team point, but the Owls rallied for the team victory by winning four of the six singles matches. Three of those six singles matches needed a third-set before they were decided.

Dating back to the 1997-98 season, Kenyon and DePauw met 35 times and Kenyon walked away a winner 26 times. Since 2008-09, the Owls won 17 straight against the Tigers.

The Owls' four losses this season came against nationally-ranked teams, while five of the team's 17 wins came against opponents who were nationally ranked within the ITA's Top-30.

The Kenyon men have 21 NCAC Tournament titles to their credit with the last of those obtained in the 2018-19 season. Since then, Denison won four straight titles (no championship was contested in 2020).

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