CHATTANOOGA, Tenn. -- The Covenant men's tennis team fell for the first time this season in a 7-2 loss to Rhodes on Saturday evening inside the Strang-Voges Tennis Center on the campus of McCallie School.

Covenant drops to 2-1 on the year, while Rhodes opens 2021 with a victory.

Despite the final score, the match was tightly-contested throughout. Rhodes squeezed past the Scots in doubles play with a trio of 8-5 scores at all three spots to take a 3-0 match lead.

Rhodes then claimed the match with wins at No. 1 singles as Covenant's Ben Luke fell to Daniel Trudell, 6-1, 6-1 before Solomon Crouch fell 7-5, 6-3 at No. 4 against Gabe Williams.

Covenant notched its two points with wins by Gill Dunn and Austin Dreslinski. Dunn took down David Phillips 6-2, 7-5 at the No. 5 spot, while Dreslinski was a 3-6, 7-5, 1-0(3) winner at No. 2 over Alex Lloyd.

Dunn and Dreslinski remained perfect on the year in singles play with 3-0 records.

The match pitted the Morton brothers against each other as Chris (Covenant) is a junior and Andrew (Rhodes) is a graduate student. Chris fell in three sets 7-6(4), 3-6, 1-0(7) at No. 6 to Rhodes' Ryan Crump, while Andrew defeated Ethan Gibson at No. 3.

UP NEXT

Covenant will travel to face Berry on Tuesday in Rome, Ga. Match time is set for 3 p.m.

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