ABILENE - Two of the Southland Conference's best tennis programs will finally lock horns Wednesday when the Wildcats of Abilene Christian and Islanders of Texas A&M-Corpus Christi clash at 10 a.m. at the neutral-site Austin Tennis Academy.
ACU's men's and women's teams had their respective matches vs. the Islanders originally scheduled for March 11 in Corpus Christi, but the doubleheader was postponed for more than a month as each side had to find an open date on their calendar. The ACU men decided to rework their schedule and cancel a home doubleheader on April 17, so that they could play the Islanders in the morning followed by a 4 p.m. dual at neighboring St. Edward's.
The ACU women, meanwhile, will only play once tomorrow before returning to Abilene for Friday's home-season tripleheader finale against Central Arkansas (9:30 a.m.) and Oral Roberts (3 p.m.). A match between the Wildcat men and ORU will take place in between the women's matches at 12:30 p.m.
Since the date of the aforementioned postponement, not many Southland teams have played better than the Wildcats and Islanders.
On the women's side, the Wildcats (15-4, 7-2 Southland) find themselves 1.0-game out of first place behind co-leaders Corpus Christi (16-5, 8-1 Southland) and Northwestern State (15-5, 8-1 Southland), while on the men's side, the Wildcats (12-9) and Islanders are each riding a three-match winning streak and tied for first place with matching 4-0 records.
ACU won for the seventh time in nine matches Sunday following its 5-2 decision over Lamar in Beaumont, Texas. The Wildcats began the dual by earning their fourth-consecutive doubles point as the No. 3 team of
Marco Bensley and
Nicklas Wingord doubled up Trey Crysel and Carl-Philip Lindqvis, 8-4, followed by No. 1s
Borja Cortés and
Guilherme Gesser edging Nikita Lis and Mikko Rajamaki, 8-6.
In singles, the Wildcats scored straight-set wins at No. 1, 3, and 6 in addition to freshman
Nico Agritelley's three-set marathon triumph over Rajamaki, 6-4, 1-6, 13-11. Agritelley's win was his fifth straight as he improved to 14-7.
ACU's women's 4-3 victory over the Lady Cardinals was a little more dramatic, but gave them a weekend sweep that also included a 6-1 win Saturday at Sam Houston State.
The Wildcats' Sunday dual started at noon in Beaumont, however, because there were three drawn-out doubles matches combined with rain and lack of an indoor facility, the match didn't end until close to eight hours later at the Galleria Tennis and Athletic Club Houston. And that's where senior
Emily Conrad broke a 3-3 tie after completing her three-set comeback over Anna Spengler at No. 6, 6-7, 6-2, 6-2.
When the teams departed Beaumont for Houston, Spengler was up in the third set, 2-1, and serving with the score at deuce.
Although Conrad's victory won the dual for ACU - its fourth-straight in conference play - she couldn't have played for the win if not for
Micah Hermsdorf's three-set thriller over Dariya Dashutina, 6-4, 1-6, 6-3, that tied the score at 3-3. Hermsdorf's victory at No. 1 was her fifteenth of the season and seventh against a conference opponent.
The Wildcats started their match in a 1-0 hole after dropping the doubles point for only the fourth time this season, but a curious thing happened during the latter stages of each of those matches as ACU started to steal some of the momentum from the Lady Cardinals.
First, the No. 2 team of
Brittney Reed and
Erin Walker came all the way back from a 6-3 deficit to win, 8-6, and then the No. 1 and 3 teams took their matches into a tiebreaker after trailing by as many as four points.
"I reminded the girls that we were only down by one and that someone was going to come out and win and tie things up at 1-1, so I felt like we had the momentum on our side," head coach
Hutton Jones said, "because we easily could have lost those matches, 8-2, 8-3, 8-3. Instead we made it a point of saying, 'we're not going anywhere.'"
Sophomore
Nada Marjanovic got the Wildcats on the board with her win at No. 5 over Hanna Elfving, 6-3, 6-2. , and a few matches later, freshman
Erin Walker won her second point of the weekend at No. 2 singles, beating Carolina Masó, 6-2, 7-6.
The Corpus Christi women's team had an eight-match winning streak in tact last week until it lost 4-0 to 27th-ranked Houston, but quickly rebounded from that defeat with a 4-1 win at home over Oral Roberts.
The Islanders' only conference loss this spring was at Northwestern State on March 16; however, they were able to climb back into a tie for first after the Lady Demons were edged, 4-3, at McNeese State Sunday.
Stefania Nicolae (8-10) has played at No. 1 all season for Corpus Christi. She is followed in the lineup by Maider Martin (8-11), Celia Rodriguez (16-3), Judit Vives (15-1), Sandra Burges (15-5) and Kerry Galhos (10-3).
The Corpus Christi men's team has beaten up on its conference foes the last two weeks, defeating Lamar, Incarnate Word and Nicholls by a combined score of 18-3. But just prior to that, the Islanders lost three of four while going up against the likes of Rice, Tulane, TCU and Oklahoma State.
Peter Nagy has been the Islanders' top player all season and enters tomorrow's match with a solid 16-3 record.
