BENTONVILLE, Ark. – For the third straight year, East Central and Ouachita Baptist will meet for the Great American Conference Men's Tennis title after the dueling Tigers scored semifinal victories on Friday at the Memorial Park Tennis Complex.

Ouachita Baptist's return to the title match came after outlasting the league's regular-season champion, Southeastern Oklahoma State, in the first 5-4 match in the tournament history. In the doubles session, The Tigers dropped two of the three points. The Central Region's top-ranked doubles team, Marko Boskovic and Vitor Oliveira, earned an 8-2 victory.

In the singles matches, Boskovic, the two-time GAC Player of the Year, beat Alberto Blesa, 7-5, 6-1, and Oliveira notched a 6-2, 6-3 win. Teodo Anghel moved the Tigers to within a point of victory with a 6-2, 6-1 win at No. 3 singles.

Southeastern's win by Renato Joao at the No. 6 spot forced a winner-take-all scenario in the No. 4 match between OBU's Maciej Braciszewicz and Southeastern's Tiago Ferreira. Ferreira won the opening set, 6-4, but Braciszewicz forced a third set by taking the second set, 6-4. Battling leg injuries through the match, Braciszewicz served for the match at 5-3, but could not close out the contest. Ferreira pushed the set to 5-5 before Braciszewicz held serve to retake the lead. Braciszewicz clinched the win by breaking Ferreira's serve. His teammates leapt over the surrounding fences and submerged Braciszewicz in a dog pile.

East Central's path to Saturday's final featured a less dramatic 5-2 victory against Harding. The Tigers took all three points at doubles. Julian Caminos and Andrew Cabato partnered for an 8-1 win at the No. 1 spot. Marc Fillat and Max DeJuan scored an 8-2 at the No. 2 position and Stefan Schodlbauer and Nate Kipping won 8-5 from the No. 3 slot.

Caminos came back and earned his second win of the day when he scored a straight-set victory at the No. 3 slot. While Harding closed the margin to 4-2 after victories by GAC Freshman of the Year Mathaus Spiering at No. 1 singles and Brandon Hogland at No. 4, Kipping closed out on the contest by rallying for a first-set loss to score a 2-6, 6-3, 6-0 victory at No. 6 singles.

Spiering's victory was his 19th of the season, the most by a Harding tennis player since Thomas Alm won 19 in 1998-99. Spiering also won 14 dual matches at No. 1 singles, the most by a Bison at No. 1 singles since Ernesto Tovar won 15 in 1991. Hogland's victory was his 11th of the season and fourth straight.

Ouachita Baptist and East Central will begin at 11 a.m. on Saturday.