Women's tennis finds groove
The women's tennis team dropped just a single team point over two matches against University of Texas- Arlington and Texas State University this past weekend at Jake Hess Stadium. With six matches under their belts, the Owls, who are now 5-1 on the year, appear to have found a routine that works. Rice took on UT-Arlington Saturday and had to battle through a rough opening round of doubles, but still managed to win all three of the close individual matches to take the early 1-0 team lead in the contest.
"I think we played very good doubles and I have definitely seen great improvement," head coach Elizabeth Schmidt said. "All we need now is consistency. I would like to see more energy and bounce in their step. I would like to see us take it to our opponent, as opposed to them taking it to us, and dictate play."
Of the six singles players, only junior Julie Chao failed to win her match convincingly. The Owls' No. 1 fell to the hard-hitting Monika Hadvigerova 4-6, 6-4, 5-10. But freshman Ana Guzman made up for Chao's loss, displaying her talent and ball control with drop shots and passes as she yanked Daiana Negreanu around for 6-4, 6-2 victory at the No. 2 spot.
"I feel great about my team, and I feel that we have a lot of potential," Guzman said. "I have been training really hard and setting my mind on things to accomplish. It's nice playing at the second spot because it helps me compete with my teammates and improve on a daily basis."
Sophomore Jessica Jackson, junior Rebecca Lin, sophomore Varsha Shiva-Shanker, and freshman Alex Rasch all won in straight sets to give Rice the 6-1 victory. Jackson has managed to keep her record stainless this entire season.
The Owls did not have much time to relish the victory since their match against Texas State commenced Sunday morning. Picking up where they left off, the team demonstrated continued poise in doubles, coming out with the early 1-0 lead after having two of three matches going to tiebreakers.
The team followed up the doubles performance with quick wins from the No. 2, 3, 5 and 6 singles spots to clinch the victory. Recovering from her tough loss the day before, Chao battled to a straight set win 7-5, 6-4 against Ashley Ellis to contribute her point to Rice's 7-0 victory.
The team had a very strong showing this past weekend, but the going gets tougher as they play 60th ranked St. Mary's on Friday and 15th ranked Fresno State on Saturday on the road.
"Every match is going to be a battle," Schmidt said. "I'm excited to play these higher ranked teams. At the end of the day, rankings are just numbers. I want to go out and play Rice tennis and show them what we can do.
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