PASADENA, Calif. – The Caltech men's tennis team defended its national No. 33 ranking in Division III with a thrilling 5-2 victory over George Fox University Thursday evening.

The Beavers picked up the first set win on Court 3, as the duo of sophomores Constantin Cedillo-Vayson de Pradenne (Paris / Lycée Jean de La Fontaine) and Tejas Ram (Allen, Texas / Allen) powered through to a 6-2 win. Unfortunately, the other two Beaver partnerships fell to their opponents in tiebreakers, and the Bruins took the doubles point.

Caltech evened out the score with the initial singles win as Ram followed with a fast 6-1, 6-1 win in #3 Singles. George Fox won the next one, and Caltech again tied things up as sophomore Eric He (Martinsville, N.J. / Bridgewater Raritan) finished off his #5 Singles rival 6-2, 6-3.

Only the even-numbered courts remained, and all three matchups resulted in split sets, meaning the first two remaining set wins would decide the overall match. Sophomore Marco Yang (Fremont, Calif. / Mission San Jose) countered his rival's 6-3 first set with his own 6-3 score, and then cruised to a 6-1 result to bring Caltech just one match point away from the clinch.

Junior Andrew Zabelo (Florham Park, N.J. / Newark Academy) on Court 2 had dropped his first set 6-3 and was in a deep hole in the second set, but he rallied to win it 7-5 and carried that momentum to a 6-2 win in his final set, securing the Beavers' seventh straight win.

Rookie Kenneth Chan (Hinsdale, Ill. / Pine Crest) battled out a 7-5 first set and just missed a straight-set win by way of a tiebreaker, but he finished off the match with another 7-5 set to pick up another singles win.

"So proud of this team today," Head Coach Adam Clark said. "The guys fought hard to turn this match around when it felt firmly in George Fox's hands. Simply put, we refused to lose."

Clark and the Beavers will head out to Claremont this Saturday at 3 p.m. to face No. 1 Claremont-Mudd-Scripps Colleges.