Junior Dragan Trivanovic's #4 singles victory gave the Lake Forest College men's tennis team a 5-4 triumph over Monmouth College in the semifinals of the Midwest Conference Team Tournament but the Foresters were defeated 5-0 by Grinnell College in the final on Friday.
Trivanovic took the first set 7-6 (7-2) and, when he and his Monmouth counterpart were late in the their second set when a Fighting Scot win at #3 tied the match at four. With players from both teams watching courtside, Trivanovic came out on top of another tiebreaker, this one 8-6, to take the second set and send the Foresters to the championship match.
Lake Forest had started the day by taking two of the three doubles matches. The Foresters took the early lead on an 8-3 victory by freshman Trevor Allen and sophomore Nick Rehm at #2. After Monmouth tied the score with a win at #3 but sophomore Dan Pivonka and senior John Snider prevailed 9-8 (7-2) at #1 to regain the lead.
Monmouth pulled even again by earning the point at #6 singles but Allen and Pivonka then finished off 6-0, 6-2 victories at #2 and #1, respectively. The Scots came back with wins at #5 and #3 to tie the match and set up Trivanovic's dramatic triumph.
Monmouth fell to 10-10 on the year.
Grinnell, the 15th-ranked team in the Central Region, was Lake Forest's next opponent. The Pioneers swept the three doubles matches and clinched the match and the 2016 MWC title with wins at #6 and #4 singles.
It was the second straight runner-up finish at the conference tournament for the Foresters, who also edged out Monmouth 5-4 before falling 5-0 to Grinnell in last year's event.
Lake Forest finished the dual match portion of its 2015-16 schedule with a 16-8 overall record. Grinnell will take a 29-5 record into the NCAA Division III Tournament next weekend.
The Foresters will conclude their season at the MWC Individual Tournaments over the weekend. The six positional singles brackets will be played out on Saturday and the three doubles tournaments will begin on Saturday and continue into Sunday.
