The Berkeley College men's tennis team picked up a key victory on Thursday evening, defeating Vaughn College by a score of 7-2 in the semifinal round of the 2016 Hudson Valley Intercollegiate Athletic Conference Men's Tennis Tournament. The match was played on the campus of Queens College. With the victory, the Knights improved their season record to 4-7, and solidified a trip to the tournament's championship match. With the defeat, the Warriors wrapped-up their 2016 campaign with a mark of 2-3.  

Berkeley College used a pair of strong efforts during doubles competition to jump ahead by a score of 2-1 on the Warriors. The Knights solidified a win at the No. 1 doubles flight when Victor Marotta and Kazuki Suzuki shutout Vaughn College's combination of Joshua Diaz and Isiah Ervin by a score of 8-0. The Knights' other doubles triumph came at the No. 2 flight where Rajah U. Mopoundza and Alexander Maurmann outworked the Warriors' Ousmane Thioune and Tobi Oladeji, 8-4. Vaughn's win at the No. 3 flight saw Ahmed Aly and Joel Haynes defeat Berkeley's Sebastian Rousseau and Andrea Massignani, 8-3.

When play switched over to singles, the Knights began to dominate, eventually winning five of the six flights to account for the 7-2 final score. At No. 1 singles, Marotta shutout Thioune, 10-0. No. 2 singles featured Mopoundza turning back Diaz, 10-4. Berkeley also solidified a victory at No. 3 when Suzuki dismissed Oladeji, 10-1. The Knights other two singles wins came at No. 4 (Maurmann over Elias Dimitropoulos, 10-6) and No. 6 (Massignani over Haynes in a classic, 10-7). The Warriors' lone win at singles came when Aly beat Rousseau, 10-5.

The Knights will now take on the No. 1 seeded Steels of Culinary Institute of America on Sunday afternoon at Dutchess Racquet Club at 3:15pm for the Hudson Valley Intercollegiate Athletic Conference title.