The St. John’s men’s tennis team put in a great showing at the annual Fall Columbia Classic this weekend as junior Mike Lampa highlighted the action by winning both a singles and doubles title at the event.
Lampa, who earned the second seed in the tournament’s second singles flight, opened the event with a hard fought 2-6, 6-2, 1-0 (5) win over Fairleigh Dickinson’s Yuri Gricheno, before defeating Princeton’s Coleman Crutchfield in another three-set battle to advance to the semifinals. The Ocean Township High School ousted Fairfield’s Dennis Zlobinksy 6-1, 6-4 to set up a finals matchup with the bracket’s top seed, Ashok Narayana of Columbia. Lampa went on to defeat Narayana 6-4, 6-3 to claim the singles title and move on to doubles play .
As the third-seeded duo, Lampa paired with teammate Vasko Mladenov in the tournament’s top doubles bracket. The pair opened the event with an 8-2 win over FDU’s Arvis Berzins and Ibrahim Shams and defeated Princeton’s Michael Lin and Yohei Shoji, 8-6, to set up an all-St. John’s final against teammates Milo Hauk and Gustav Kallen. Hauk and Kallen defeated Columbia’s Nathaniel Gery and John Yetimoglu, 8-5, and Penn’s Zach Katz and Ivan Turudic, 8-4, to reach the finals. Lampa and Mladenov were able to continue their run with an 8-6 victory over their teammates to claim the win . Next up for the Red Storm was their final tournament of the fall, the annual USTA/ITA Regional Championships, which this year were at Cornell University in Ithaca, N.Y. The tournament finished up on Monday (Oct. 17).
Lampa was the Big East Freshman of the Year in 2010 when he was 18-2. He was also made the All-Big East Team.
At Ocean Township, Lampa won the 2009 NJSIAA singles championship in his senior year defeating Shore Regional’s Michael Lippens (now competing for Louisville), 6-4, 6-2.
Lampa had a career mark of 109-7 for the Spartans. He was the 2008 NJISAA singles runner-up.