MALIBU, Calif. - The UC Irvine men's tennis team opened the ITA Southwest Regional Championships with one round of doubles and two rounds of singles Thursday at Ralphs-Straus Tennis Center.
 
The Anteaters had two doubles wins against Pac-12 opponents in the Round of 64. In their season debut, Brandon Park and Noah Zamora, who earned first-team All-Big West honors last year, defeated UCLA's Gianluca Ballotta/Jorge Gonzales Plans, 8-5. Rithvik Krishna and Andy Nguyen also took down Arizona's Inaki Cabrera-Bello/Gustaf Strom, 8-3.
 
The 'Eaters carried the momentum into singles where they went 6-2 in the Round of 128. Freshman Andy Nguyen cruised to a 6-0, 6-2 victory over Darius Tamaddon of Loyola Marymount. Graduate student Matthew Sah also upended the Lions' Nicolas Pesoli, 6-2, 6-2.
 
Senior Ali Amiri, junior Lawee Sherif and graduate student Hiroki Sakagawa all got the best of their respective Big West opponents. Amiri dispatched UC Santa Barbara's Diego Castillo, 6-1, 6-1, while Sherif beat UC Riverside's Joshua Roth, 6-3, 6-1. Sakagawa added a three-set victory against the Highlanders' Ryan Huynh, 6-2, 1-6, 6-2.

Amiri and Sakagawa continued to roll in the Round of 64. Amiri secured UCI's first ranked win of the season as he came from behind to top No. 53 Noah Berry of Cal Poly, 2-6, 7-6 (5), 6-4. After dropping the first set, Sakagawa was dominant the rest of the way for a 4-6, 6-1, 6-0 win over Eugenio Gonzales of San Diego State. 
 
Graduate student Enrique Luque Rico received a bye into the Round of 64 where he defeated Quinn Snyder of Hawai'i, 7-5, 6-1.

Zamora dropped a tightly-contested 7-6 (3), 7-5 decision to No. 61 Pablo Masjuan (UCSB). Nguyen and Sherif also fell to ranked opponents.
 
UC Irvine continues the ITA Southwest Regional Championships tomorrow with the doubles Round of 32 at 9 a.m.