WALLA WALLA, Wash. -- The George Fox men's tennis team traveled to Whitman for the annual ITAs, with several Bruins getting their first taste of collegiate tennis and one Bruin reaching the finals!

How It Happened
Players from all eight NWC teams competed in the Northwest Regional, competing in three brackets — an "A" doubles bracket and "A" and "B" brackets for singles, with multiple consolation "B" brackets sprinkled in.

The number-two-seeded Moore was the star of the show for the Bruins this weekend, blazing his way to the "A" bracket singles finals. He pushed through a third-set match in the round of 16, taking the rest of his matches in two sets before facing off against Whitman's number-one-seeded Niklas Jensen. His first set demonstrated perseverance until the end in a 6-4 loss, eventually falling in set two, 6-0, and claiming runner-up honors. Moore would be one of three Bruins in the "A" bracket to surpass the round of 32 on the weekend.

Aiden Cruz and 12th-seeded Keita Shoji made it out of their first bouts of the "A" bracket, with Aiden Cruz edging out a solid 6-4, 6-4 victory to take down Whitman's Ben French in the round of 64 before falling to Brooks Lerfald of Linfield in the round of 32 (6-0, 6-4). Meanwhile, Shoji had a bye, beginning his competition in the round of 32, where he gutted out a match tiebreak of 10-7 against Whitman's Drew Harrison while advancing in his following match, taking set one 7-5 and dominating in a 6-1 victory in set two against Whitworth's Judson Connor. He went on to be the second of three Bruins to fall at the hands of Jensen in the "A" bracket, with set scores of 6-0, 6-3.

Garrett Little made a run in the "A" bracket consolation rounds after his loss to the eventual winner of the singles race, Niklas Jensen, in the round of 32. Little posted a tough win in a thrilling match, with a tiebreak result of 10-4 over Whitworth's Dalton Polesky. His next opponent would give the match directly to Little due to injury, advancing him to the semifinals, where he combined for five game wins despite a 6-2, 6-3 loss on Monday.

Guy Morian rounded out the Bruins' "A" bracket competitors, losing his first game against future quarterfinalist Alexander Kinoshita of Pacific. In his Bruin debut match, Morian combined for three game wins, losing 6-1, 6-2. He began his matchup in the round of 32 with a narrow victory margin in the first set of 7-5 and serving returns on a platter in set two with a 6-1 victory. He would eventually go the distance in the quarterfinals, bouncing back from a 6-0 set-one loss with a 7-6 [9-7] comeback in set two before falling in the match tiebreak, 10-7, to end his campaign.

In Bracket "B" competition, newcomer Colton Symes made the most noise for Fox. He demonstrated elite focus in his route to the quarterfinals. He paved through Brandon Tran of Linfield in a 6-0, 6-2 bout before unloading another stellar performance over Puget Sound's Marcello Sachelari in a 6-1, 6-1 defeat. Symes would lose his first set 6-2 versus Matthew Hossack but presented him with a challenge in set two despite ultimately losing 7-5 in the end.

Jorge Mayorga made it out of the first round in the "B" bracket with a commanding 6-2, 6-0 win over Puget Sound's Jackson Bodie, moving on to a close performance in the round of 16, where Mayorga would lose set one 6-3 before equalizing in set two with a score of 6-2, forcing a match tiebreak, which resulted in a suspenseful 10-7 loss.

Another Bruin to push past the round of 32 was another newcomer by the name of Gian Marko Marrero. Marrero took down Luca Finegan of Puget Sound in a 6-3, 6-4 contest. Marrero would go on to lose to Samuel Henderson of Linfield in two sets (6-3, 6-2).

Eric Topacio had a bye in the round of 32, setting his sights on Linfield's Jack Nagler, who took home a victory in the first round in a tightly contested two-set match. Topacio would win set one versus Nagler 6-2, proceeding to narrowly lose set two 7-5 before falling in the match tiebreak in heart-wrenching fashion with a 10-8 finish.

Jayden Lovingfoss would go on to lose his initial match 6-4, 6-2 versus Spencer Shade of Whitworth. He would go on to fall to Willamette's Jack Hally in two sets while also competing in the "B" Draw Yellow bracket, where he lost his first match 6-3, 6-2.

Marrero and Mayorga both competed in the "B" Draw Blue bracket, with Mayorga advancing to the finals while Marrero would lose 7-5, 6-1 in the semifinals to Sachelari.

Cruz and Moore reached the farthest point for Fox in the doubles bracket. The seasoned duo put together a string of impressive victories, with their first match ending 8-1 and their second match 8-4, making it to the quarterfinals due to a first-round bye. The second-seeded team managed to push Whitworth opponents Matthew Froslan and Ryan Ashley to the brink in a narrow loss of 8-7, with a 7-5 tiebreak result.

Morian and Little made it to the round of 16 after back-to-back 8-5 victories before losing to Pacific's Jonathan Nguyen and Dawson Hose 8-3.

Other pairings of Topacio and Marrero, along with Shoji and Symes, both won their second-round matches before losing in the round of 16. Topacio and Marrero lost 8-4 to the eventual finalist for Whitman, while Shoji and Symes fell 8-5 to a Lewis & Clark duo of Kaden Sigurdsson and Noah Sutin.

Lovingfoss and Mayorga would lose in their first matchup in the round of 32 with a final score of 8-5 against Brandon Tran and Samuel Henderson of Linfield. They would move on to the round of 16 in the consolation bracket, where they would lose 8-3 to Jason Rowe and Yuzheng Yang of Puget Sound, who would lose in the quarterfinals.

Overall, multiple Bruins debuted with fiery energy that they hope to take with them to the spring against Northwest Conference opponents.

Coach's Thoughts
Coming soon…

Up Next
The Bruins will look to build off of their ITAs experience and gear up for the spring of 2027.