Men's tennis opens season at Army

SMITHFIELD, R.I. – The Bryant University men's tennis team begins its quest for a seventh-consecutive Northeast Conference Championship this afternoon when it opens it 2021 campaign at Army.

Under the direction of 15th-year head coach Ron Gendron, the Bulldogs have become the Black and Gold standard in the NEC. Gendron has won a league-record, for any sport, seven-straight NEC Coach of the Year honors, while the Bulldogs have won more league titles than any other school since 1999.

And now, after a year of waiting, Bryant men's tennis is ready to get back to work. There quest will include a lot of familiar faces in the travel party: Wilson Dong, Trent Massam, Grant Pertile, Andrew Pregel and Andrew Forchetti. It will also include a bevy of underclassmen that are fired up for their turn to contribute to the legacy.

Leading the way will be Dong, the 6-4, 215-pound senior from Bradenton, Florida. Dong was the 2018 NEC Rookie of the Year and then earned All-NEC First Team honors as a sophomore in 2019. That season, he and Matt Kuhar became the first doubles team in NEC history to compete at the NCAA Tournament.

Classmates Trent Massam and Grant Pertile strengthen Bryant's resilient backbone. Massam was an All-NEC First Team doubles player in 2019 and won eight matches playing at the No. 2 spot in the lineup in 2020. Pertile is also a former All-NEC doubles player, earning first team honors as a freshman in 2018.

Bryant is also excited about the edition of Diego Serra Sparrow from Lima, Peru and Diego Trejo from Dallas, Texas. Serra is a 6-2 freshman that has built a UTR of 11, while Trejo has quickly emerged as one of the fastest, and most athletic players on the courts.