By Jimmy Friery
February 28, 2026

(SANTA BARBARA, Calif.) The Westmont Men's Tennis team (5-3) fell to PacWest title contender Biola (7-0) on Saturday morning via a 5-2 score. Sophomores Antoine De Cooman and Sidharth Maharana won the two Warriors' points after prevailing in long third-set tiebreaker victories.

"I was really proud of the efforts of Antoine and Sid," head coach Chris Elwood said. "They both played terrific singles and well-fought victories to get us the two points."

The visitors were favored to win the doubles point with two pairs in the top 20 of the preseason's ITA Division II male doubles rankings. Arjun Sivakumar and Zach Steinberg were battling, down 4-3, on court three before the two other Biola teams clinched the point.

In No. 4 singles, De Cooman won his first set 6-3, but the result flipped in the second. The matchup was destined for a competitive tiebreaker, and the Belgian finally prevailed 14-12 to win the Warriors a point.

It was a similar story on court six for Maharana. He dropped a tough 7-6 (7-3) first set, but kept his match alive with a 7-5 second-set win. Mahara's grit continued as he won another incredibly competitive 14-12 tiebreaker for Westmont.

Biola won in straight sets on courts one, two, three, and five to ultimately win the match at the 5-2 final. 

"We fought well, we had chances," Elwood spoke of the match as a whole. "Giving ourselves a legitimate chance against a strong team is something we can take from the match."

The Warriors certainly can use those positives next week, a three-match week. Before traveling to Claremont-Mudd Scripps on Saturday, Westmont hosts Jessup and Hawai'i Hilo on Tuesday and Thursday, respectively.