The No. 11 Texas A&M women’s tennis team took on No. 67 Kentucky Wildcats on March 24, sweeping them off the court 6-1.
The match started with doubles play. While Court 1 had the ranked No. 5 pair, the most dominant doubles duo was junior Mary Stoiana and sophomore Mia Kupres on Court 3. The team of sophomore Nicole Khirin and graduate Sydney Fitch gave the Aggies their first win as they led with a victory over Kentucky’s freshman Julia Zhu and junior Lidia Gonzalez, 6-0.
Their win was followed by junior Jeanette Mireles and freshman Lucciana Perez, who took on junior Ellie Eades and sophomore Zoe Hammond to ensure the doubles point, 6-1.
No. 36 Kupres doubled the lead for A&M after her win against Gonzalez, 6-0, 6-0. With her serve and volley abilities, Kupres had the upper hand as Gonzalez struggled to respond to the cross-court serves. Stoiana, the No. 1 player in the country, came back and won, 6-2, 6-1 against Stevens, putting the Aggies at a 3-0 lead against the Wildcats.
Zhu won her fourth straight match in the Southeastern Conference against Mireles. Zhu started with a 4-0 lead in the first set, but Mireles came back to even the set before Zhu hunkered down to gain the only singles win for the Wildcats. She served for the match and claimed victory on the following point.
The Maroon and White secured their last set of victories that helped them clinch the match. Junior Ellie Pittman took on sophomore Ellie Myers and won 6-2, 6-4. This marked Pittman’s first conference singles match of the year on Court 6.
On Court 4, freshman Lucciana Perez’s slice shots were no match for Eades as the Wildcat continued to respond on the baseline. Perez’s quick responses caused many faults on the Kentucky player’s end as most serves were responded to by shots that hit the net.
No. 14 Khirin then went up against Hammond and won, 7-5, 6-3, which led A&M to its sixth win and Khirin’s 14th-straight win.
“The conditions were about as tough as it could be, and we handled it well,” coach Mark Weaver said. “It was a very decisive weekend for our team and our confidence continues to grow.”
A&M women’s tennis is set to play LSU at the LSU Tennis Center on Friday, March 29 in Baton Rouge, Louisiana at 5 p.m.
Lina Hunsperger • Mar 26, 2024 at 8:32 am
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