The Tribune

By BRENT STUBBS

Senior Sports Reporter

bstubbs@tribunemedia.net

THE Bahamas men’s team pulled off their first two victories to set them up for a possible shot at advancing to the playoffs in the American Zone III Davis Cup tie for a chance at getting promoted to zone II next year.

The team, captained by John Farrington, was scheduled to play Honduras in their third match after the completion of their rain delayed second match against Bermuda yesterday at the Club de Tenis La Paz in La Paz, Bolivia.

No results for the match against Bermuda were available up to press time last night.

After Devin Mullings gave the Bahamas a 1-0 lead with his 7-5, 6-0 win over Gavin Manders, the rain halted play on Wednesday, forcing officials to call off the rest of the matches. They came back yesterday and top seed Kevin Major Jr prevailed with a 6-4, 6-2 win over Na’im Azhar.

With a commanding 2-0 lead, the duo of Marvin Rolle and Jamal Adderley put the icing on the cake with their 7-6 (2), 6-3 decision over Jenson Bascome and Philip Cooper to seal a 3-0 sweep over Bermuda.

The Bahamas opened play on Monday with a 2-1 victory over Panama. In that match, Mullings cruised with an identical 6-3, 6-3 win over Luis Fernando Garcia. Major, however, lost in the same score 6-3, 6-3 to Walner Espinoza.

That set the stage for the pivotal doubles in which Rolle and Adderley took care of Espinoza and John Silva and 7-6 (4), 6-4.

The Bahamas then had a day off on Tuesday as Farrington noted that they were able to take advantage to use the time to get acclimatised to the high altitude in Bolivia.

Against Bermuda, the Bahamas was to face a team that had not won any of their first three matches in the tie.

Today, the Bahamas is scheduled to end their round robin play against Costa Rica.

With five teams in their pool, the Bahamas will need to finish in the top two in order to advance to the playoffs on Saturday where they will cross over to play one of the top two teams out of pool A. Those teams are Paraguay, Jamaica, Bolivia and Cuba.

The final two teams out of the top four will get promoted to zone II for 2014.

The Bahamas last played in zone II in 2009 at the National Tennis Centre. In that match, the team of Mullings, Timothy Neilly, Rolle and Bjorn Munroe, captained by Farrington, lost 3-2 to Guatemala and were relegated to zone III.

Neilly was originally named to the team in Bolivia, but he had to withdraw because of an injury and was replaced by Major, who is playing in the top spot with Mullings moved to No.2 for the first time.