Tennis advances to late rounds in tourneys
By Colin Ake/ Student Publications
Amanda McDowell returns a ball in a match. She was one of the Jackets who advanced to the main tournament and made it to the semifinals.
The Tech women's tennis team continued its match play last weekend, playing in the ITA All-American tournament.
The Jackets had another strong outing, with five players sweeping their two-match qualifying rounds on day one.
Senior Whitney McCray beat seeded Gira Schofield of South Carolina and Chisako Sugiyama of Michigan in straight sets. No. 2 Kirsten Flower won in three sets, 4-6, 6-4, 7-6 (7-3) over Ellah Nze of Duke. Flower's next match was not as long as she defeated Southern California's Gabriela Niculescu in straight sets, 6-0, 6-2. Sophomore Amanda McDowell swept Wake's Alex Hirsch, 6-0, 6-0, and beat Fresno State's Renata Kucerkova, 4-6, 6-1, 6-2, in her second match. Cristy Striplin defeated Easter Michigan's Vanessa Frankowski, 6-1, 6-2, and Utah's Liz Ferris, 6-1, 6-4, on the day.
Finally, newcomer Maya Johansson swept her matches with victories over Pepperdine's Bianca Dulgeru, 6-2, 6-0, and a 7-6 (2), 6-3 victory over No. 9-16 seeded Seminole Lauren Macfarlane. Johansson won three pre-qualifying matches to make the qualifying bracket.
The second day of qualifying saw several Tech players lose. Both seeded Tech players lost their final qualifying round. Striplin fell to Yasmin Schnack of UCLA, 6-4, 6-4, and Flower lost to Arkansas' Aurelija Miseviciute, 6-2, 6-1.
Despite the setback, three Jackets did qualify for the main draw. McCray, Johansson and McDowell advanced to the next round and day.
The main draw began the next day with four of the five Tech matches ending in victory for the Jackets. McDowell defeated No. 7 Georgia Rose of Northwestern in straight sets, 6-3, 6-0. Johansson also defeated a ranked foe in No. 8 Celia Durkin of Stanford.
McCray won two matches on the day. The first was a 4-6, 6-4, 6-2 over Ela Kaluder of Arkansas. The second match was a doubles match with senior Kristi Miller. The tandem was seeded No. 3 in the tournament and beat Pepperdine's Sylvia Kosakowski and Bianca Dulgheru, 8-5.
The only poor mark on Tech's main draw record was No. 5 Miller's loss to Schnack of UCLA, 6-4, 6-2. Shnack defeated two ranked Tech opponents in a row to make it to the second round of the main draw.
The following day, the Jackets continued their run with McDowell and Johansson both winning back to back games to make the semi finals. McDowell beat Florida's Csilla Borsanyi, 6-3, 6-3, and followed that with a tough match against Laura Vallverdu of Miami, 5-7, 7-5, 7-6 (9). Johansson beat Baylor's Lenka Broosova, 6-2, 6-4 and Riza Zalameda of UCLA, 3-6, 6-0, 6-2.
Miller received a bye in the round of 16 in the consolation qualifying bracket and beat UCLA's Tracy Lin in the consolation quarter finals, 7-6 (3), 6-4. McCray lost in the round of 16 to Ani Mijacika of Clemson, 6-2, 6-0.
The next day saw all but one run come to an end. Fourth ranked Suzi Babos of California beat McDowell 6-2, 6-4 in the semi-finals.
Miller lost in the consolation semis to Rose (Northwestern), 3-6, 6-4, 6-2. Ani Mijacika beat a second Jacket when Johansson fell 6-2, 6-0.
McCray and Miller won their semi-final match against LSU's Megan Falcon and Hannah Robinson. Unfortunately, they also lost in the finals to Tennessee's Caitlin Whoriskey and Zsofia Zubor in straight sets, 7-5, 6-3,.
The Men's team played two tournaments over the last two weeks. Over fall break, Tech hosted the Men's GT Fall Tournament.
Many of last season's injured players made their return to the court, including Tech's top player David North.
North was relegated to a doubles match as he and freshman Guillermo Gomez lost in the first round of the "A" doubles bracket, falling to UGA's Drake Bernstein and Joshua Varela 8-6.
Afterwards, the Men's team traveled to Columbia, South Carolina for the USC Fall tournament the following weekend. The Jackets did not have a good outing there as they lost three out of four opening day matches.
Miguel Muguruza won his match against Arkansas' Chris Nott, 6-4, 1-6, 6-2. Eliot Potvin lost to Winthrop's Vinicius Bortolatto in straight sets, 7-6, 6-1 and Javier Rodriguez of Belmont beat Doug Kenny in three sets, 2-6, 6-2, 6-1.
