Kenosha, Wis. -- While the Thunder men's tennis team will not officially begin its dual match schedule until Februrary 2027, this weekend brought an opportunity for competitive action for eight of the ten student-athletes on this year's roster. A group of Wheaton players traveled to the campus of Carthage College on Friday and Saturday to take part in the 2026 CCIW Individual Championships. Wheaton's participating squad consisted of seven singles entries and four doubles pairings, and two Thunder duos earned third-place finishes in the doubles brackets this weekend.

Senior Andrew Jang led the lineup in the #1 singles category, and after falling to opponents from North Central College and Carroll University on Friday, he claimed seventh place in the top singles bracket via a withdrawal from Carthage on Saturday morning.

Fellow veteran Andrew Winters took part in the #2 singles competition and finished eighth in his bracket field.

Ryder Ward was Wheaton's entry for the #3 singles program and matched Jang on a seventh-placed showing after his IWU opponent also withdrew with an injury this morning.

Toby Schmidt shrugged off an opening round defeat in the #4 singles bracket to claim fifth via a hard-fought 8-6 win in the second phase and a dramatic come-from-behind tiebreak victory in the fifth-place match. The Iowa native dropped the first set, 6-0, but fought back to win the second at 7-5 before edging out his Augustana opponent, 10-8, in the extra frame. 

Joshua Hartman nearly secured this same standing in the #5 singles field after taking down an opponent from Carroll in the second round via an 8-3 line. But he fell 11-9 in a razor-tight tiebreak game to a counterpart from Illinois Wesleyan and came in sixth instead.

Elliot Mathew matched Schmidt on fifth place in the #6 singles competition after dispatching his IWU opponent, 8-4, in the consolation bracket before advancing due to another withdrawal.

William Horton made his collegiate debut this weekend and outlasted his Illinois Wesleyan opponent, 6-3, 2-6 [10-5], to finish seventh in the #8 singles competition.

Jang and Winters knocked off North Central's top doubles pairing with an 8-4 decision in Friday's first round and edged a different Cardinals duo this afternoon, 8-7, to secure a podium finish in third place.

Schmidt and David Hill placed fifth in the #2 doubles field after responding to their first round setback with a dominant 8-1 victory over a Carroll pairing and a gritty 8-6 win over their Millikin foes.

Hartman and Ward topped a team from North Central in the first round of the #3 doubles bracket and eventually finished third thanks to an 8-3 success over a Carthage duo this afternoon.

Horton and Mathew fell in their first two fixtures of the #4 doubles program and placed seventh thanks to an IWU withdrawal on Saturday.

After taking to the courts for the first time in 2026-27, the Wheaton squad will next be in action when select team members travel to Indiana on the first weekend of October for the ITA Central Region Championships.