Eyewitness Account from Georgia women's victory over Georgia Tech Saturday
Julie Wrege was in Atlanta for the Georgia-Georgia Tech dual match Saturday. On a chilly day in front of a large crowd, Wrege watched Georgia come back from a 3-0 deficit to take down the Yellow Jackets. Here's her account:
Fourth-ranked Georgia upended #1 Georgia Tech in an incredible collegiate match. Georgia Tech was without their #2 player Amanda McDowell (nationally ranked # 4) due to a minor injury, so the Tech lineup was altered from their 7-0 defeat of Georgia at the Indoors just 2 weeks ago. And Georgia took full advantage of this alteration.
Tech was fortunate to take the doubles point, winning at #3 and losing #1 -- the point decided by a fantastic finish at the #2 spot. Whitney McCray and Sasha Krupina came back from being down the entire match and 5-7, to win over #21st-ranked team of Yvette Hyndman and Naoko Ueshima 9-7.
Tech went up 2-0 quickly when Maya Johansson defeated Adrienne Elsberry 6-1, 6-4 -- and then Kristi Miller defeated Kelly Hyndman 6-1, 6-2 at #1 singles to set Tech up with a 3-0 lead.
Then freshman Cameron Ellis of Georgia earned Georgia their first point, winning the #5 singles match over Tech freshman Noelle Hickey 6-3, 6-4. This was closely followed by Ueshima wining over #54 Christy Striplin at #4 singles -- and then Georgia freshman Yvette Hyndman evened the score at 3-3 with a three-set victory at No. 2 singles over #21 Whitney McCray.
Just after the Hyndman win, Tech's #30 Kirsten Flower, who had won the first set in a tiebreak, dropped the 2nd set 6-3 to Georgia's #51 Monika Danecevic, setting up the final set for the match for either squad. Flower raced off to leads of 4-0 and 5-2, with Danecevic seeing the trainer at every change for cramps. But she fought through long points to come back for the win 7-5 -- and the victory that gave Georgia its second win over the National Indoor Champions. The last was also over Georgia Tech in 2007 when Georgia upset Tech in dual match play.
For the full results, see the georgiadogs.com website.
4 comments:
Sounds like that was a great match. What a comeback by UGA, even if Tech wasn't at full strength, their roster is still very deep. As I said before, the women's tournament in May will be wide open with any number of teams capable of winning it all.
I just got back from watching the Florida men beat Illinois 6-1. Perfect day for tennis. Gators easily won at 1 and 3 to take the doubles point. Then they built a 3-0 lead with routine wins by Hochwalt and Hamui at 5 and 6. Florida won the 1st set at 3, but Illinois took sets at 1, 2 and 4. All 4 courts were forced to a 3rd set, with Illinois' Heiser closing out Dadamo on court 4 for the Illini's only point. Oullette broke in the 11th game and served out the match at 7-5 over Rowe. Lacroix followed right behind with a 6-2 3rd set win over Spicijaric and Briceno capped it off with a tiebreak win.
Florida is very young, but the freshmen are coming along nicely and this could be a team to watch out for down the road. See how they fare tomorrow against Pepperdine.
I love this time of year when it's heating up outside and we get to see a lot of great tennis.
Yeah I think the UF vs Pepp match will be a great one. Pepperdine have had a bad start to the year with lots of close losses. FSU had a thrilling victory over them on the weekend. We shall see what happens in Gatorsville on Monday. The Illini put up a good fight but once the fourth point fell they lost all momentum
Pepperdine pulls out the 4-3 win, 7-5 in the 3rd Lemke over Dadamo. Pepperdine won the doubles easily on courts 1 and 2, then took a 3-1 lead with easy wins at 1 and hard fought 3 setter at 3. Florida won easy at 5. Pepperdine had taken the 1st set in the other 3 matches, but Florida roared back to force 3rd sets in all of them. Briceno and Hamui won and it all came down to court 4. Dadamo broke to go ahead 4-3, but was broken back and then against at 5-6 to secure the match for Pepperdine.
Scott,
Thanks so much for giving us these updates!
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