Northwestern Surprises No. 7 Seed Alabama in ITA Women's Indoor First Round
©Colette Lewis 2013--
Charlottesville, VA
The Northwestern Wildcats advanced to the quarterfinals at the ITA Women's Team Indoor Friday, ousting No. 7 seed Alabama 4-1.
Other than the photograph of Linda Abu Mushrefova clinching the match at Court 5, I can't add much to the coverage, because I was watching the Duke-Baylor match on the Stadium Courts while Alabama and Northwestern were playing on the back courts. When Duke claimed their 4-1 win over the Bears, four of the Northwestern-Alabama matches were in the third set, and after the Wildcats had taken the doubles point, and a straight set win at No. 3, they were in good shape to close it out, with Mushrefova finishing the 3 1/2-hour match. Northwestern is ranked 14th, while Alabama is No. 9, so it was hardly a colossal upset, given the Wildcats history on indoor courts in general and at the Team Indoor in particular. Northwestern won the Team Indoor title in 2009 and 2010.
Northwestern 4, Alabama 1
1. #12 Mary Anne Macfarlane (UA) vs. #67 Kate Turvy (NU) 4-6, 7-5, 2-5, unfinished
2. #13 Alexa Guarachi (UA) def. Veronica Corning (NU) 6-1, 2-6, 6-2
3. Belinda Niu (NU) def. #59 Maya Jansen (UA) 6-4, 6-2
4. Brittany Wowchuk (NU) def. Antonia Foehse (UA) 6-2, 0-6, 6-4
5. Linda Abu Mushrefova (NU) def. Emily Zabor (UA) 4-6, 6-0, 6-3
6. #105 Natalia Maynetto (UA) vs. Nida Hamilton (NU) 7-5, 6-5, unfinished
Doubles competition:
1. #2 Alexa Guarachi/Mary Anne Macfarlane (UA) def. #42 Linda Abu Mushrefova/Nida Hamilton (NU) 8-1
2. Veronica Corning/Alicia Barnett (NU) def. Antonia Foehse/Maya Jansen (UA) 8-2
3. Belinda Niu/Kate Turvy (NU) def. Yasmeen Ebada/Emily Zabor (UA) 8-4
Match Notes
Order of finish: Doubles (1,2,3); Singles (3,2,4,5)
9 comments:
Fun watching the live scoring for National D1 Team Indoors. I was watching Nebraska versus Miami. I was thinking that Nebraska might have lots of Americans (versus foreigners for Miami), so I looked at their two rosters:
Miami:
Monique Albuquerque 5-8 Fr. Porto Alegre, Brazil (C.E.M. Pastor Dohms)
Melissa Bolivar 5-5 Jr. Barranquilla, Colombia (British International College)
Brittany Dubins 5-10 Jr. Fla. (Dr. Krop HS)
Kelsey Laurente 5-3 Fr. Miramar, Fla. (Florida Virtual School)
Lina Lileikite 5-9 So. Liepaja, Latvia (A. Pushkin Secondary No. 2)
Clementina Riobueno - Fr. Barquisimeto, Venezuela
Deborah Suarez 5-9 Fr. Weston, Fla. (Broward Virtual School)
Stephanie Wagner 5-7 Fr. Amberg, Germany (Carl Friedrich Gauss Schule)
Nebraska:
Lehmicke, Maggy Fr.Kirkland, Wash. (Chrysalis School)
Veresova, Patricia Sr.Piestany, Slovakia
Wagner, Lauren Fr. Roslyn Heights, N.Y. (Laurel Springs School) (Weil Tennis Academy)
Weatherholt, Mary Sr. Prairie Village, Kan. (Shawnee Mission South)
Weinreich, Janine Sr.Tespe, Germany
Weinstein, Stefanie Sr. Much, Germany
Zeppernick, Maike Jr. Hamburg, Germany (Gymnasium Buckhorn)
Zgierska, Izabella So. Miesbach, Germany (Gymnasium Miesbach)
3 out of 8 on each team are from the U.S. Interesting.
In the Baylor - Duke match, 9 of the 12 singles players were from US.
Baylor didn't use to be that way though. They used to not have hardly any Americans. They have broken through finally.
Duke, well, everyone wants to go there or Stanford, right?
USC versus Texas A&M:
USC--all Americans almost.
Texas A&M:
Maria Ines Deheza - Fr. HS Santa Cruz, Bolivia
Maria Paula Deheza - Fr. HS Santa Cruz, Bolivia
Stefania Hristov 5-5 Fr. HS Iasi, Romania (Edison Academics, USA)
Anna Mamalat 5-4 Fr. HS Philadelphia, Pa. (Commonwealth Connections Academy)
Cristina Sanchez-Quintanar 5-7 Sr. 1L Campo de Criptana, Spain (Maryland) (Ministry of Science/Education)
Cristina Stancu 5-7 Jr. TR Constanta, Romania (Liceul cu Program Sportiv Nicolae Rotaru)
Wen Sun 6-0 Sr. 1L Dalian, China (Tyler JC) (Dalian Financial Business Sch.)
Nazari Urbina 5-3 Sr. 3L Xalapa, Veracruz, Mexico (CONAMAT)
'They have broken through finally.' Does this imply that it is a good thing? One can argue both ways. The only win from BU was by a foreigner. When BU was dominated by foreigners, they beat Stanford at NCAA like two years in a row. Now, BU loses to Duke, which was without Capra and Kahan. What can be the lesson here? Without foreigners it is extremely difficult for lesser popular teams to compete against Stanford or Duke which are studded with the creme de la creme of American girls?(After all, college sports is also mainly about scouting, no?)
Great point Mr./Mrs. Fan.
Yes, but the really strong blue chips often want to be on a mostly American team (i.e. not filled w/ foreigners that they don't relate to). A common refrain that we used to hear was "Oh but that team has too many foreigners. They don't even hardly speak English".
So to start getting them (American blue-chippers) in, you have to start somewhere. Baylor really did that. Started (I think?) w/ Abby Stainback, then Meghan Horter, Jordaan Sanford, Alex Clay and Alex Leatu.
Don't know if its right or wrong but its what we used to hear...far more likely that a blue chip American will now consider Baylor...
Well, I don't think top Americans juniors will likely consider BU or Nebraska, let's say they're not Stanford or UCLA(academically, and 'culturally';not a fun enough place to live haha). Foreigners are great equalizer for the league. Without them the matches will be even more lopsided. Just recently Claus lost in a tiebreaker to Hardebeck and the day after, Issara actually beat Hardebeck. Well American Guillermo did beat Gibbs, but Pepperdine has GREAT location, right beside the beach, haha.
Ha ha, are you saying that the beach is nicer than Waco? Or freezing Nebraska, lol?
Gosh...can't imagine!
But of course lol. Why do Midwest elites escape their home states. Gibbs, Turewicz, McPhillips..Austin likely too. McPhillips especially mentioned the location as one of the reasons she picked UCLA haha.
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