Houghton College came out ready to play Saturday afternoon in the battle of the two undefeated Empire 8 teams, scoring an 8-1 victory over Nazareth College. Houghton would fight hard to take a 3-0 lead in closely contested doubles play. Jake Fisler and Micah Schilke won 8-4 at the first spot, followed by Ethan Yung and Levi Webb taking the second position 8-6 in a great comeback from 4-1 down. Ben McKay and Adam Brown rounded out the doubles with a thrilling 8-6 match.

    With match momentum high the Highlanders would not stop there. Ethan Yung rolled at first singles without dropping a single game for a 6-0, 6-0 win, and Jake Fisler pulled a decisive 6-1, 6-2 victory at the second spot to clinch the match. At the third and sixth singles positions, Micah Schilke and Levi Webb closed out epic 3 set matches, with Schilke prevailing 0-6, 6-3, 11-9 and Webb 6-3, 2-6, 10-6 respectively. Rounding things out at the fourth spot was Matt Cicero with a steady 6-3, 6-0 victorious effort.

    "The guys came ready to play today. We knew this was going to be a big one. Nazareth has had some fantastic results so far this season and we knew they would come at us hard in this match. The doubles was key. Getting off to a 3-0 start is invaluable in competitive play and it gave us the momentum to take a rolling lead in a few of the singles matches. The energy was high, several of the matches were well fought and our guys stayed really steady and focused throughout. I'm super proud of their effort and excited to continue our series with Naz."

    Houghton will enjoy this victory and get back into action next Friday when they travel to Utica College.