From Case Western Reserve University Athletics

Case Western Reserve University junior Matthew Chen and first-year James Hopper claimed the Division III doubles title at the 2019 ITA Cup on Saturday, becoming the first duo in program history to accomplish the feat.

By virtue of winning the Division III doubles draw, the Spartans will continue play at the ITA Cup on Sunday, facing the winner of the JuCo draw, while on the other side of the draw, the Division II winning duo will play the NAIA winner.  The victors from each of the two matches will then face off for a ticket to the ITA Fall National Championships in California.

NCAA Division II, NAIA and JuCo winners will be decided later in the day on Saturday.

Chen and Hopper, who were seeded third overall in the draw, defeated the second-seeded duo of Bradley Cummins and Brysi Libao of Redlands 7-6 (7), 6-7 (8), 6-4 to claim the championship on Saturday.

The Spartans earned their way into Saturday's championship match with a pair of wins on Friday.  In the quarterfinals, Chen and Hopper bested Sebastian Castillo-Sanchez and Andrew Imrie of RPI in three sets, 6-3, 6-7 (2), 11-9, fending off three match points.  Later in the day, the pair fought their way to another three-set win, this time upending the tournament's top-seeded team of Peter Frelinghuysen and Alex Taylor of Williams 6-7 (3), 6-1, 10-3.

Chen and Hopper improved to 13-0 in doubles matches together this fall.

Also on Friday, Hopper wrapped up a fifth-place finish in the singles draw with a 7-6 (4), 6-4 win over Vishnu Joshi of Johns Hopkins.  He ended his fall campaign with a 16-1 singles mark.