FLORENCE, Ala. – Jax State men's tennis produced one final highlight in their Fall schedule recently as Vanja Dobrnjac finished first in the top singles flight at the North Alabama Invitational in Florence. That triumph by the lone returning senior on the squad serves as a big piece of momentum as the Gamecocks look forward to the upcoming Spring 2024 slate.
 
"It was a big trip to Florence for us," head coach Trey Morris said. "As a whole, we did really well. We were pretty dominant across the weekend and had two players going into the finals in Vanja and Aman Dahiya. Counting doubles, we played in three championship matches on Sunday and won one, so I'm very pleased there."
 
Dobrnjac opened the invitational with a two-set win over Troy's Luciano Alcocer, 6-1, 6-2. The senior from Bosnia and Herzegovina then battled UNA's Lachlan Brain, claiming a three-set triumph (6-4, 3-6, 6-4) on Brain's home court. In the championship, he downed Jonasz Dziopak of Tennessee State, 6-1, 6-4, to win the hardware in Colbert County.
 
"What I saw from Vanja is a guy who's starting to put it all together," Morris said. "Any coach across the country could look at him and see that he's very gifted and able to do a lot of things on the court with his style of play. I think he's starting to assert his will when he plays, dictating tennis and doing a better job with his court positioning. If he can stay on it and continue to play that way, his final Spring at Jacksonville State could be one for the record books."
 
Along with Dahiya and Dobrnjac, senior Liam Day and junior Logan Haga also made the trip to northwest Alabama for that weekend event. Day scored a victory in three sets (6-4, 6-7 [5], 6-2) against a competitor from Samford while Haga picked up a 6-0, 6-2, result over another Bulldog. Dahiya tallied a singles win against one of Samford's student-athletes, overcoming a slow start to win in three sets as well (1-6, 6-1, 6-2).
 
Jax State's two doubles tandems totaled two wins each in Florence. Dahiya and Haga beat teams from Alabama A&M and Tennessee State and Dobrnjac and Day knocked off opponents from UNA and AAMU.
 
"I'm excited," Morris said as the team wraps up its Fall competition schedule. "We've seen tremendous growth this Fall already from both returners and newcomers. Everyone is maturing, buying into the new philosophies, and working hard and I could not be happier with that."
 
After the conclusion of the North Alabama Invitational and Ivan Marrero Curbelo's run at the Winston-Salem 15K ITF Futures event, Jacksonville State men's tennis will begin preparations for its first Spring under Morris. The Gamecocks will undergo a training block through the remainder of the Fall semester and over winter break, leading up to their first regular season contests in January.
 
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