RICHARDSON, TX (02.16.19) - The UT Dallas men's tennis team kicked off the spring season Saturday morning with a 7-2 win over East Texas Baptist at the UTD Tennis Courts.

The Comets (1-0) opened play with a pair of doubles wins and then took five of six singles duels to complete the victory over ETBU (3-1).

The Comet tandem of Ashwin Vaithianathan and Hayden Steffes opened the action wtih an 8-2 win over ETBU's Salinas/Tarver before UTD's top-flighted pair of Mario Jelev and Giovanni Zamboni claimed the same result over Tigers Moris and Herr.

In singles play, Zamboni opened with a 6-1, 6-0, win at No. 2 to give the Comets a 3-1 lead and Eric Chen added a 6-4, 6-0, win at No. 5 to push UTD to a 4-1 advantage. Jelev collected the match-winner at No. 1 with a 7-5, 6-2, win over Joseph Salinas. Steffes (No. 4, 6-2, 6-2) and Jed de Luna (No. 6, 6-0, 6-4) also claimed singles wins.

UTD returns to action Sunday with a 1 p.m. road match at LeTourneau.