JANE LEE
Assistant Sports Editor
The No.-11 Pepperdine women’s tennis team closed out the regular season in fine fashion (just as it’s done all year), walking away with a win as it handed Florida International a 5-2 defeat Friday at the Ralphs-Straus Tennis Center.
The Waves, who finished the season 17-3 on senior day, snapped FIU’s 13-match winning streak.
“I found out the day before the match that Florida International had beat Long Beach State, which is a very good team, so I was expecting them to be tougher than their ranking,” Head Coach Gualberto Escudero said.
Pepperdine immediately stole the momentum away from the Golden Panthers, as it continued to dominate in doubles play. The No.-22 duo of junior Eva Dickes and sophomore Bianca Dulgheru easily defeated Egle Petrauskaite and Shilla D’Armas 8-1 while the pair of junior Caroline Raba and senior Natalie Braverman clinched the doubles point for the Waves with an 8-5 victory over Courtney Johnson and Bruna Discordia.
The only surprise came at court one, where the Golden Panthers’ Nikkita Fountain and Paula Zabala upset the No.-21 Wave duo of sophomore Sylvia Kosakowski and senior Merve Asimigil with a score of 8-5.
FIU followed up with a point in singles play at court three after Raba walked off the court due to a pulled muscle in her hamstring. The Waves, however, fought back and quickly received three straight wins from Braverman, Kosakowski and Asimigil to clinch the match.
It was the last regular season match of their collegiate career for Braverman and Asimigil. While Braverman grabbed a 6-2, 6-3 victory at the No.-4 spot over Fountain, Asimigil defeated Desanka Jovanovic 6-4, 6-2 at No. 6. Kosakowski followed the lead of her senior teammates, earning a 6-4, 6-4 win over D’Armas at the No.-2 spot.
“I knew all their players could play well in singles, but we have a pretty fiery team that can play with the best on any given day,” Escudero said. “We played very strong singles matches against them.”
After FIU’s Zabala claimed the first set over No.-25 Dulgheru with a 7-5 final, the Waves responded with a 6-1 victory in the second set to force the match to a tiebreaker. Dulgheru, who the Waves have been able to depend on all season long, confidently recorded a 10-7 victory to put away the Golden Panthers.
“I was happy with the overall performance because it’s always hard playing your last match knowing you should easily win it,” Escudero said.
Although the regular season has officially concluded, the Waves will look to keep on rolling when they compete in the West Coast Conference Championships from April 21-23 up north in Santa Clara.
“It’s been a year of improvement, and we just want to make sure we carry that into conference,” Escudero said. “I think everyone knows we’re the favorite to win it, and I expect us to win just as the team expects us to win.”
Even though the Waves are expected to breeze through the tournament, Escudero said he expects his team to be more than prepared for any competition that comes its way.
“I expect them to keep working hard in practice until conference time,” he said. “It’s supposed to rain here for awhile, but that won’t keep us from conditioning, which is the most important thing to do when preparing for winning a championship.”
04-13-2006
