SALISBURY, N.C. – For the first time in program history, the No. 15 University of North Georgia (UNG) men's tennis team is going to the NCAA Men's Tennis National Championship site as the Nighthawks took down No. 8 Catawba 4-3 Saturday in the 2025 NCAA Southeast Regional Tournament.

With the historic win over the second-seeded Indians, the Nighthawks punched their ticket to the 2025 NCAA Division II Men's Tennis Championship May 20-24 in Altamonte Springs, Fla. at Sanlando Park.

This accomplishment has been a long time coming for head coach Kent Norsworthy and UNG. 

Norsworthy has steered the Nighthawk men's and women's tennis programs since their NCAA inception in 2006. On the men's side, he went the first six years without a winning season. But after going 14-9 in 2012 for the first winning year in program history, the Nighthawks were selected to the NCAA Tournament for the first time ever.

Since then, UNG has appeared in 10 NCAA tournaments, all of which have come in the last 13 years. Now 19 years after the program began, Norsworthy finally has a team that will get a chance to shine on the national stage. 

"It's amazing. I don't know if it's a hundred percent sunk in yet," said Norsworthy. The delay in his realization was perhaps caused by the questions that surrounded his team this year. 

The Nighthawks raised doubt this season as to whether they had what it would take to reserve their seat at the National Championship table. It started in the very first match of the season when UNG lost 4-3 against Lincoln Memorial for the first time since 2009.

"This team was up and down this season. We had a tough loss early, so we had questions a lot of the season," said Norsworthy. 

Through the bumps and bruises along the way, the Nighthawks showed signs that they were made for this. They picked up five ranked wins before the NCAA Tournament, one of which came against Catawba in early March as one of only two regular season losses for the eighth-ranked Indians. The lessons learned this season helped UNG pull off a win against their highest-ranked opponent since 2021 on Saturday. 

The Nighthawks started the day with a massive victory in the doubles competition. 

Junior Pedro Liborio and freshman Janos Varga battled early in the #2 doubles match but trailed 3-2 in the middle stages. The Nighthawk duo then exploded for four straight wins to claim a 6-3 victory. 

Almost simultaneously, senior Robin Eldin and freshman Juan Cruz Blanco took down Luca Bergonzi and Agustin Mastri 6-3 in the #1 showdown. 

UNG suddenly took a 1-0 overall lead into singles play. 

Catawba quickly tied the match with a victory in #5 singles. Another win from Mateo Berne in the #2 slot gave the Indians their first lead of the day at 2-1 overall. 

However, victories were looming in other matches for the Nighthawks. 

In the #3 singles match, freshman Franco Rebora was in the middle of a decisive third set against Bergonzi after the pair split the first two sets 6-2 each. In the third set, Rebora jumped out to an early 3-1 lead and did not look back. After Bergonzi won a game to make it 3-2, Rebora rattled off four straight wins to clinch the second point of the match for the Nighthawks with a 6-2, 2-6, 6-2 victory. 

Minutes later in #4 singles, sophomore Marcos Castellanos had taken a thrilling first set 7-6 (7-5 tiebreaker) over Ryosuke Inagawa. In the second set, Castellanos left no doubt as he erased his opponent with a 6-0 victory to give UNG the lead once again.

With only two matches left to finish, the Nighthawks were in the driver's seat up 3-2 overall.

However, Mastri pulled out a 2-6, 6-4, 6-3 win in #1 singles to tie the overall match. Both team's seasons would come down to #6 singles.

In that #6 singles match for UNG was, of course, freshman Lleyton Beasley. 

Loyal fans will understand how fitting it is that Beasley found himself under the lights in arguably the biggest singles match in North Georgia men's tennis history. 

The rookie has been in this spot before. Granted it was not on a stage like this, but it's not often that a #6 singles freshman gets the chance to clinch three victories in one year for his team. 

Beasley helped the Nighthawks to their first win of the year as he clinched a 4-3 victory for them over rival Young Harris with a thrilling win in the #6 match way back in February. 

He would do the same thing 10 days later on the road against Auburn Montgomery, once more pulling off an entertaining victory in the #6 singles match to secure a 4-3 win. 

85 days after that win over the Warhawks and nearly a month removed from his most recent victory, Beasley would once again have to be the savior for UNG. 

The freshman recovered from a 4-6 loss to Luca Accomando in the first set with a 6-2 victory in the second set. 

It was practically predictable that the match would be determined in a decisive third set. Almost more predictable was what came next; a tiebreaker. 

Despite jumping out to a 5-2 lead in the set, Beasley dropped four straight games and fell behind 6-5. 

He only lost one point in the next game to tie the set at 6-6 and force the tiebreaker. 

In the tiebreaker, Beasley lost the first point. However, he shocked the on-looking Indians players by going on a six-point streak to earn a 6-1 lead and hold match point. 

As Accomando had already proven in this match, he would not go down without a fight. Facing match point three times, Accomando scored against Beasley each time to make it 6-4 in the tiebreaker. 

On the fourth straight match point, after an excruciatingly long rally, Beasley found himself directly in front of the net on the left side of the court with nothing but open room on the other side. 

It took 40 shots between the two players to get there. In the midst of one of the longest rallies of the match, Beasley gained an edge as he moved Accomando to his right with a backhand shot deep into the corner. Accomando lunged and returned the ball across the net. 

With his opponent out of position, Beasley crossed sides and forced Accomando racing to his left. All he could do was flick the ball high into the air with his backhand. 

After charging the net with Accomando on his heels, Beasley traced the lofted ball backwards and struck an overhead forehand shot directly at Accomando in the left corner. Accomando rifled it back over the net. At close range, the long frame of Beasley skipped to his left and spiked the ball with a backhand flick. It bounced twice and chaos ensued. 

Beasley's Nighthawk teammates screamed joyously. They charged the court and pounced on their teammate at the net. A dog pile ensued as 19 years of coming short melted away. Despite seven losses this season, despite the sixth-seed in the region, despite having to face the second-seeded host on their own turf, the Nighthawks did it. They took down Catawba to make program history. 

Beasley is impressively composed for a first-year player that has found himself in a number of high pressure situations. It's his calm demeanor that allows him to perform when the match is on the line. 

"It was really tough. I just tried to stay as calm as possible and do what we do in practice, just hitting cones and it ended up going my way," Beasley said with a nonchalant shrug after the clinch.

"Getting through was a massive dream for these guys too," Norsworthy said, pointing to Liborio and Beasley to his left and right in the post match press conference. "We've never been there before with the men and hopefully we can get there and do some damage, but right now we've got a few days to enjoy and celebrate." 

Liborio summed up the day and season in the press conference after the match. The junior said, "For some moments I believed we were going to be here, for some moments I didn't believe we were going to be here. But through the last couple of weeks I was very confident that moment was going to come and Beasley just did it once again. Here we go to Orlando now."

UNG did what many thought it was incapable of doing Saturday. Now the Nighthawks will get a chance to do it again. For the first time in school history, North Georgia men's tennis is heading to the 2025 NCAA DII National Championship.