ATLANTA ? Neither the rain nor Arizona could derail the Kentucky women?s tennis team on Saturday afternoon as UK cruised to a 4-0 victory in a battle of Wildcats in the first round of the NCAA Tournament at the Bill Moore Tennis Center on the campus of Georgia Tech.
With the win, Kentucky improves to 19-7 on the season and has a chance to reach 20 wins for the third time in five years on Sunday. It is the Wildcats 10th straight trip to the second round of the NCAA Tournament. Arizona?s season ends at 9-14 overall.
Kentucky goes for its sixth straight round of 16 appearance on Sunday when it faces host third-seeded Georgia Tech at Noon. The Yellow Jackets dispatched of Furman, 4-0, in the first round.
?We did a great job as a team of staying disciplined during pressure filled situations,? Kentucky head coach Carlos Drada said. ?I feel that we have put ourselves in a great spot to compete tomorrow against a very good Georgia Tech team.?
As first sets were coming to an end in singles, the sky opened up and rain forced the match indoors. At that point, the NCAA decided that the matches closest to completion would get first preference on the indoor courts. As it happened, the three matches chosen were at Nos. 3, 4 and 6, each of which UK was up a set on.
First off was Sarah Woestmann, who continued her mastery at No. 3 singles with a 6-2, 6-2 win over Natalia Toporowska. The All-SEC honoree improved to a team best 21-4 since joining the team in January.
Fellow freshman Whitney Spencer followed just minutes later by finishing off Camelia Todorova, 6-0, 6-1 at No. 4. In her first match at the position, Spencer ran her personal win streak to seven and improved to 17-4 in dual action while giving UK a 3-0 lead in the match.
As two other matches resumed in on the courts Woestmann and Spencer had just vacated, sophomore Carolina Escamilla clinched the win for the Wildcats with an easy 6-2, 6-2 win over Jessie Rochefort on No. 6. The win snapped a three-match slide for the Colombian.
Early on, the match was hotly contested. Kentucky rallied to win a doubles point that took nearly 90 minutes with wins at Nos. 2 and 3. On court two, Joelle Schwenk and Escamilla ? playing together for the first time all year and just the fourth time ever ? came back from two breaks down to score a 9-7 win and put the onus on the teams at No. 3.
Leading 7-6, Toporowska had a chance to serve out the match and claim the doubles point for Arizona, but Spencer and Caroline Winebrenner broke and eventually forced a tiebreaker, which the pair won 7-3 to give UK a 1-0 lead.
?The doubles was crucial in the match today,? Drada said. ?It helped us that we played with a lot of poise regardless of what the scores were in the matches.?
NCAA Tournament First Round Bill Moore Tennis Center Kentucky 4, Arizona 0 Doubles No. 1 ? Mavrolean/Steinberg (UA) def. Coventry/Woestmann (UK), 8-2. No. 2 ? Schwenk/Escamilla (UK) def. Rochefort/Todorova (UA), 9-7 No. 3 ? Spencer/Winebrenner (UK) def. Orletsky/Toporowska (UA), 9-8 (3). Singles No. 1 - Kim Coventry (UK) vs. Danielle Steinberg (UA), 4-4, suspended. No. 2 - Juliette Mavroleon (UA) led Joelle Schwenk (UK), 6-2, 0-0, suspended. No. 3 - Sarah Woestmann (UK) def. Natalia Toporowska (UA), 6-2, 6-2. No. 4 - Whitney Spencer (UK) def. Camelia Todorova (UA), 6-0, 6-1. No. 5 - Katie Orletsky (UA) led Jessica Giuggioli (UK), 3-2, suspended. No. 6 - Carolina Escamilla (UK) def. Jessie Rochefort (UA), 6-2, 6-2. Order of Finish Doubles: 1, 2, 3. Singles: 3, 4, 6.
