BETHPAGE, N.Y. - The Daemen College men's tennis team suffered a 7-2 loss today in East Coast Conference action against league-favorite N.Y. Institute of Technology. 

With the loss, Daemen falls to 5-15 on the season, and 0-2 in ECC play. NYIT, which has won the last four ECC titles, ran its league winning streak to 29-straight (regular season & conference tournament) while improving to 7-2 this season (2-0 in ECC matches). 

The Bears established a 2-1 lead after doubles play. Daemen picked up a point on the second doubles court from sophomores David Gonzalez Villegas (Pereira, Colombia/Liceo Frances de Pereira) and Ricardo Ruiz Martinez (Valencia, Spain/American International College) as the pair downed NYIT's Rafael Charkiewicz (Opole, Poland) and Rares Ispes (Focsani, Romania) 8-4. Charkiewicz and Ispes came in as the No. 2 ranked doubles pair in the East Region.  The win gives Gonzalez Villegas 11 doubles victories this season, setting a new team record for a single season; seven of those wins have come while paired with Ruiz Martinez who joined the team this semester after transferring from American International College where he earned All-Rookie Team honors in the Northeast-10 Conference last season.

Needing four points in singles play, the Wildcats got just one, but it was a big one as Ruiz Martinez picked up his second point of the match with a 6-2, 6-0 defeat of NYIT's David Jiang on the third singles court. Jiang came into the match ranked 15th in the East Region.  Ruiz Martinez is 8-7 in singles matches this season, and he's tied with junior Mark Veitengruber (Rockford, Mich./Rockford) for the team lead in singles victories.

Daemen looks to jump back back into the win column with a non-league match at Caldwell University Sunday.