Tennis teams quite impressive in ITA

The men’s and women’s tennis teams showed teams from the region and conference that they were here to compete for national recognition.

The Georgia College & State University tennis teams won some very key matches and showed their strength against some of the best players in the nation.

“We had some pretty good results,” said Head Tennis Coach Steve Barsby. “We had a win in doubles. There are still some things we need to work on, but we are going in the right direction.”

GC&SU’s Luiza Biktyakova and Mia Paavilainen won the Intercollegiate Tennis Association Mid-Atlantic Regional Women’s Tennis Doubles Championship on Sunday.

This has earned them the right to compete in the National Championship tournament later this month in Texas.

Paavilainen and Biktyakova are both newcomers to the Bobcats this
season. They have quickly made an impressive debut by knocking off the second seeded team of Manuela Emmrich and Zsofia Golopencza from Armstrong Atlantic State University (8-5) in the championship match.

The Bobcat duo rolled to an 8-1 victory in the opening round on Friday and followed that with an impressive 8-6 victory over Augusta State’s Ana Skafar and Patrice Zurita in the round of 16. They cruised to an 8-2 victory over Augusta State’s Hayley Bakker and Patricia Lozano in the quarterfinals and then advanced to the championship with an 8-3 win in the semifinals. This marks the fifth time in the last six years that the Bobcat women’s doubles team has won the regional.

“Because it was the ITA regional it qualifies them for the national tournament in Texas in two weeks,” said Barsby. “We will start gearing up for that and give it a run. In the past we have had teams get in the finals of the national after winning the regional. But we have never won it, so maybe we can pull off something out there.”

Also in doubles, GC&SU’s Annika Persson and Carolina Lefevre won their first two matches before falling in the quarterfinal round to Golopencza and Emmrich.

The Bobcats also did well in singles as Biktyakova, and Persson advanced to the semifinals of the tournament.

Persson won her first two matches in straight sets before pulling out a hard fought 6-3;4-6;6-4 win over Armstrong Atlantic State’s Gemma Vaughan in the round of 16. She followed that up with a 7-6;6-2 win over third seeded Jackie Nieto in the quarterfinals. Persson lost to second seeded Ana Skafar 6-2;7-5 in the semifinal on Sunday.

Skafar also defeated GC&SU’s Paavilainen 7-5;6-3 in the quarterfinals.

Biktyakova won her first four matches in straight sets before falling to Golopencza, the defending national singles champion, 6-4;6-3 in the semifinals.

GC&SU’s Lefevre won her first three singles matches in straight sets before falling to Golopencza in the quarterfinals. GC&SU’s Kelly Miller also picked up a pair of singles wins in her Bobcat debut before falling to University of South Carolina at Spartanburg’s Kim Jamieson 6-1;6-3 in her third match.

“I was very impressed by the way our girls, being a young team, played,” said Barsby. “I was very impressed at how they came out over the weekend. We ended up with four girls in quarterfinals and two in semis, we didn’t get through any of the semis but we played pretty well. But I was definitely very pleased with the girls.”

On the men’s side, GC&SU’s Thomas Karlsson and Per Schartum-Hansen battled for a 9-8 victory over Barton University’s John Marte and James Rusbton. The team fell 8-2 in the round of 16 to top seeded Achim Roth and Dale White of Armstrong Atlantic State.

In other action, GC&SU’s Lance Grisham and Thomas Hemmestad dropped their first round match 8-4.

In singles play, Mikael Pettersson won his opening match 7-5;6-2, but he lost in the second round to top seeded Jaco Kruger from Lees McRae 6-3;2-6;6-1.

“The guys were improved from last year,” said Barsby. “Mikael Petterson had a great tournament. He lost to the first seed but he was the closest match the guy had all weekend.”

Coaching the tennis team has been an eye-opening experience, but Barsby keeps his focus and keeps the teams ready for their next challenges and maybe even a national title.

“It seems like were going to match up well with some teams that we didn’t match up well against last year,” said Barsby. “We will go from there and work hard the rest of the fall and see if we can be ready for the spring, and improve on our performance from last year.”

The ITA National Championship Tournament will be held in Corpus Christi, Texas, Thursday, Oct. 17 through Sunday, Oct. 20.

Posted by Colonnade Archives on Oct 11 2002. Filed under Sports. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0. You can leave a response or trackback to this entry