JANE LEE
Sports Editor
Upsetting opponents is nothing new for Andre Begemann.
Just five months ago the junior clinched a national championship for the Pepperdine men’s tennis team by grabbing a big victory at the fourth position in singles over a tough Georgia opponent.
Playing at home last weekend for the first time this season in the Intercollegiate Tennis Association Men’s Regional Championships, Begemann and his underdog success continued, as he captured his first individual championship Monday.
The eighth-seeded Begemann knocked off the No.-1 seed, the No.-4 seed and, finally, the No.-2 seed to claim the singles title and earn an automatic spot to the ITA National Intercollegiate Indoor Championships on Nov. 2-5 in Columbus, Ohio.
Begemann defeated UCLA’s Chris Surapol in straight sets at Pepperdine’s Ralphs-Straus Tennis Center. After trailing 2-0, Begemann came back to win the first set 6-3 and followed with a 7-6 victory in the second set to capture the title.
The match marked the second time that Begemann and Surapol had met. In February, Surapol claimed the win in three sets when Pepperdine and UCLA faced off in the regular season.
En route to his championship win, Begemann knocked off No.-1 seed Benjamin Kohlloeffel of UCLA, who is ranked No. 1 in the ITA’s preseason rankings after winning the 2006 Singles Championship in May.
The junior became the first Wave to win the ITA Regionals Singles Championship under fourth-year Head Coach Adam Steinberg, who watched his standout doubles team of Ivor Lovrak and Pedro Rico capture the ITA Regionals Doubles Championship last year.
In other action over the weekend, Pepperdine’s top-seeded duo of Begemann and sophomore Omar Altmann handed Arizona’s double team an 8-2 defeat before falling 8-6 in the semifinals to UCLA’s Mathieu Dehaine and Jeremy Drean.
10-26-2006