“I knew that the guy I was playing was [Minnesota’s] main source of energy,” Chu said. “When he won the first set of our match, he was really encouraging everybody else, all of his teammates, and the crowd especially. He was being very loud, and I knew that I needed to, in some way, reverse the energy he was giving to the rest of his team.”

Sure enough, with Chu’s win giving Harvard a 2-1 overall edge, the Crimson seemed revitalized. Nguyen took the No. 4 slot 4-6, 6-2, 6-2, and Harvard needed only one more singles match to clinch a team victory.

Of the three matches left on-court, though, only senior George Turner’s No. 6 seemed close to swinging in Harvard’s favor. Though Turner had lost the first seven games of the match, he fought for breaks in the second and third sets and ultimately won 0-6, 7-5, 6-4.

Nguyen deemed the comeback “exhilarating,” while Fish called it an “extreme example of the kind of passion [Turner] plays with.”

But last week, at the USTA/ITA National Team Indoor Championships, Turner was not in the lineup.

“He wasn’t starting,” Fish said, “and he was still the biggest cheerleader. He was still going out for six-mile runs in the morning and he was still totally committed to the team, so that set the bar so high.

“That, to me, set the tone for this past weekend. When he got in, he just let it all go, and [his win] couldn’t have happened if he’d been sulking on the sideline.”

Turner’s victory clinched Harvard’s triumphant comeback, and as the Crimson awaits the forthcoming Harvard Men’s February Open Championships on home turf, the team’s confidence is high.

“To know that your teammates are in it through thick and thin and aren’t going to give up an easy point and will fight with you to the very end,” Chu said, “it’s certainly something that inspires you to work [at] anything to win.”

Anything is right.

“We [were] sort of bent,” Fish said of the past weekend’s wins, “but we didn’t break.”