VILLANOVA, Pa.—A young Villanova (5-7) team faced a Saint Joseph's (6-4) squad made up entirely of seniors and graduate students and was narrowly defeated in a 4-3 decision at the Villanova Tennis Complex on Wednesday afternoon. The lineup for the Wildcats included exclusively freshmen and sophomores in the six singles matches where the team came away with three victories.
 
The two biggest wins of the day for Villanova came from freshmen Josh Robinson (Potomac, Md.) in the No. 2 singles match and Ryan Nguyen (Oakton, Va.) in the No. 6 spot in the lineup. Robinson defeated Nickolas Frisk in a 6-4, 6-4 decision and Nguyen was a 6-3, 6-1 winner over Luis Janko. Freshman Eitan Khromchenko (Manalapan, N.J.) overcame losing the first set in his No. 3 singles match to outlast Eshan Kanetkar for a 4-6, 6-1, 6-4 victory.
 
Consecutive wins by Robinson and Khromchenko tied the team score at 3-3 after the Hawks won the doubles point to start the day and led 3-1 after the first four singles matches (1-6-5-2) had been completed. Saint Joseph's secured the outcome with a three-set win at No. 4 singles where Francesco Mowrey narrowly defeated sophomore Daniel Cheng (Los Angeles, Calif.) in a 3-6, 7-5, 6-4 decision.
 
"This was a tough loss for the guys today because there were some extremely bright spots for the team," Wildcats head coach Brad Adams said. "In singles our guys to the last point and came up just short. Josh had a monster win at two two singles and picked up a doubles victory, Eitan was able to fight back from being a set down to tie the match at 3-3, and Ryan has just been a rock at six singles picking up another victory."
 
Each of the Villanova singles winners have played .500 or better in their matches this season. Khromchenko leads the Wildcats with a 6-5 singles record while playing all but one of his matches in the third spot of the lineup, while Robinson is 5-5 on the year and has played exclusively in the No. 2 spot. Nguyen is 5-3 overall and has won three of the four matches he has played at No. 6 singles.
 
Robinson and junior Matthew Jones (Dallas, Texas) picked up Villanova's only doubles win against the Hawks as they were 7-5 winners over Frisk and Mowrey in the No. 2 match. Sophomore Alex Kim (Cary, N.C.) teamed with Nguyen for the first time at No. 1 doubles and fell to Nathan Perrone and Kanetkar by a 6-3 count, while Cheng and freshman Noah Winton (Columbia, Mo.) lost a 6-2 match at No. 3 doubles to Johnnie Massart and Alex MacNeil.
 
"We have come up short too many times in doubles where we dug ourselves into a very tough hole to get out of against experienced opponents," Adams said. "We will continue to improve our doubles play and learn from experience. We are looking forward to the next challenge in front of us at UPENN this Friday."
 
Villanova travels to Philadelphia for a match against Penn on Friday at 2 p.m.