Longtime doubles partners for the University of Detroit-Mercy Titans men's tennis team, Patrick Troy (Birmingham Brother Rice) and Nick Tolomei (Rochester Adams) may have struggled on the court in the 2009-10 season, but they certainly didn't off of it.


They were two of three Titan men's players recently recognized as Scholar-Athletes by the Intercollegiate Tennis Association, helping their team earn All-American Academic Team status for the season, just its second as a varsity program. Troy had a 3.8 GPA, while Tolomei sported a 3.667, helping raise the Titans to a 3.329 team GPA.


The  UDM women's tennis team was also honored, as five Scholar-Athletes helped the Titans to a 3.469 GPA.


Tolomei and Troy teamed up for 13 wins at No. 3 doubles in 2008-09 — helping Tolomei earn the Coaches Award as a freshman a total of 24 wins that ranked third-best on the team —  but were just 5-6 together in 2009-10.


A junior-to-be, Tolomei wasn't idle during the summer, either, going 5-1 over a three-day span to make it to the finals of the ITA Midwest Summer Circuit in July, upsetting No. 8-seeded C.J. Griffin of Penn State in the round of 16, before losing to Dartmouth's Brandon DeBot, 6-4, 6-1.


“I played my best when it counted. In every match that I played three sets, I lost the second so I lost the momentum, but I was able to recover and move on,” Tolomei said in a story on DetroitTitans.com.  
“Everyone here is a good player so to be able to defeat not only him (CJ Griffin), but the others will give me great confidence going into the season as I will probably face a lot of these guys again.”