Penn State's No. 1 doubles team of Dave Schoenly and Dave Welch further established itself as one of the best teams in the East by finishing second last weekend at the highly competitive Princeton Quadrangular.

"We had a couple good wins which should really help us," Schoenly said.

Seeded second, Schoenly and Welch had little resistance on the road to the finals, dropping only one set in the first three rounds.

In the finals, the No. 1 seeded pair of Ab Boonswang and Greg Sinck of Princeton edged Schoenly and Welch, 6-3, 6-7, 7-6 (7-5).

"Those guys (Finck and Boonswang) are the best in the league," Coach Holmes Cathrall said. "(But Schoenly and Welch) had an opportunity to win it (in the third set)."

Schoenly attributed the problems in the third set to "probably a combination of my serve not holding up as well as it had in the past and they started to return really well."

Despite the loss in finals, the Lions' top pair still accomplished what they had set out to do last weekend.

"A good goal for us would be to finish in the top three," Schoenly said before the tournament.

If Schoenly and Welch, who have only lost twice this fall, continue to play as well as they have been, they stand a good chance of receiving an invitation to the ITCA Rolex Regionals, which will be held in early November at Princeton.

The Lions' lineup was weakened by the absence of freshmen Jason Rayman, Mark Price and Corey Goldstein, who are observing Rosh Hashanah. The three also will miss this weekend's tournament at Old Dominion.

In singles play, only No. 4 seed Welch and No. 7 seed Schoenly advanced past the first round. Welch advanced to the quarterfinals before losing.

Mark Cavalier, Scott Pickering and Sean Snee each won a match in the singles consolation bracket before being eliminated.

Penn State's other three doubles teams lost in the first round of the tournament; however, the team of Cavalier and Pickering advanced to the finals of the consolation bracket where they lost to a pair from Penn, 6-4, 6-3.

"We played real well getting there and then we let down," Pickering said.

"For a team, (Cavalier and Pickering) play very well together. They're familiar with each other's moves," Cathrall said.

Penn State used its eighth and ninth different doubles combinations last weekend, and for the time being anyway, Cathrall will continue to experiment to find the best combinations.

"Right now, there's no set teams," Cathrall said.

Penn State continues its busy fall schedule this weekend in Norfolk, Va., where it will compete against Maryland, Virginia Commonwealth, Richmond, East Carolina, Atlantic Christian and host Old Dominion.