Miseviciute and Koniecko Earn ITA Indoor Titles with Three-Set Wins
©Colette Lewis 2008--
Charlottesville, VA--
Top seed Aurelija Miseviciute of Arkansas earned her second straight ITA Indoor Championship again over Clemson's Ani Mijacika, 1-6, 7-5, 6-4 coming from 4-1 down in the third set, while No. 8 seed Bryan Koniecko won the battle of the Buckeyes, defeating Justin Kronauge 6-2, 5-7, 6-3 to claim the men's title Sunday at the Boar's Head Sports Club.
Miseviciute credited a point penalty she received in the the fifth game of the final set with helping reverse her fortunes.
"At 1-3, I missed an easy shot and didn't say a good word in my language," admitted Miseviciute, a senior from Lithuania. "But the ref, she knew it and asked me if I said that word and I said well, yes I did, and she said well then it's a code violation. But maybe that helped me. I was mad about it, so I forgot about all the other stuff, the score and everything and said I'm just going to play now."
Mijacika, who had lost to Miseviciute in the 2007 final in a third set tiebreaker, could not keep her own mind from wandering during the match's final stages.
"At 4-1 I was thinking what would happen if I won the National championship and I got nervous," said Mijacika, a junior from Croatia. "I started thinking too much, how big is this and I became nervous and couldn't play like I did in the beginning."
Mijacika came out with her forehand blazing in the first set, finishing any short ball at the net and hitting winner after winner. Miseviciute made a few more errors than customary at the start, but she admitted that she was powerless against that level of play.
"I was a little nervous, wasn't playing my best tennis, but she was playing great," said Miseviciute. "She was playing the best I've ever seen her play and I really couldn't do anything about it. My coach said hang in there, see what happens and maybe you can get back in the match. Last year I think we were both very, very nervous and the quality of the tennis wasn't really good, so this year I was trying to make it a better match, playing better tennis."
After failing to hold serve even once in the first set, Miseviciute regrouped in the second, and broke Mijacika to take a 4-3 lead. She failed in her first attempt to serve out the second set at 5-4, and it looked like should would again when serving at 6-5 0-40, but she won the next five points to take the second set. At 4-4 in the third, another third set tiebreaker loomed, but Mijacika's backhand began to break down and a series of errors led to a 5-4 lead for Miseviciute. Mijacika had one opportunity to get back on serve at 5-4 30-40, but two more errors, this time off the forehand side, gave Miseviciute her first match point. After a short rally, Mijacika's slice caught the tape, giving Miseviciute her second National title.
"It's a pretty good feeling, it's really rewarding," said Miseviciute. "When I was leaving for this tournament a lot of my friends, my assistant coach, my teachers, were saying go get 'em, go defend your title. I was like yeah, I'll try, but in my mind I thought it's kind of tough to do, to win a second time in a row. But it's a good feeling, I'm happy."
In the men's final, Koniecko started quickly, but unlike Mijacika, he was able to recover from the loss of the second set and earn his first National title and the first singles championship for Ohio State since assistant coach Jeremy Wurtzman's Indoor title in 2003.
"I started out serving very well," said Koniecko, a senior from New York. "I didn't give him many opportunities on my serve, which made it a little bit easier to break. I think Justin started out slow, but he definitely picked it up in the second set and made it a great match."
There is always an uneasiness to a teammate vs. teammate final, with the competitive edge that drives college tennis competition notable in its absence.
"It's tough," agreed Koniecko. "We practice with each other every day. He's a great competitor, he fights for every point. I'm just happy we had a great match and it's nice to win."
Koniecko was broken only once in the match, when he was serving down 5-6. He held a game point at 40-30, but lost the next two points, the last on a forehand error, and suddenly, the match was even.
"I didn't make any mistakes," said Kronauge of those crucial few points at the end of the second set. "I tried to get to the balls as fast as I could, as well as I could. He might have gotten a little tight, trying to close it out."
Koniecko got the only break he needed in the fifth game of the final set, and continued to protect his own serve. Serving at 3-5, Kronauge dug out of a 0-30 hole, but Koniecko kept the pressure on and two points later, when Kronauge's half-volley caught the tape, Koniecko had his title.
"It's a relief," said Koniecko. "It was a goal from when I came into school. It's nice."
For assistant coach Wurtzman, who spent the first part of the match practicing with Ohio State's other quarterfinalist, Steven Moneke, and the second part watching neutrally from the stands, it was a satisfying tournament.
"It's quite an accomplishment to have two guys in the final. It was good to see and it's great to be a part of another championship for Ohio State," Wurtzman said. "Coach Tucker has done an incredible job since he came in and it's nice to add more to the program."
Wake Forest's Steve Forman and Cory Parr wrote a new chapter in Wake Forest tennis history, claiming the school's first Indoor title with a 7-6(3), 7-6(5) win over USC's Robert Farah and Steve Johnson.
"It's great for us and for the other guys on the team, because our main goal is to do well as a team," said Parr, a senior from New York. "To see that we can play with the better players and better teams in the country, and know that our team is just as good."
There were no service breaks in the first set, but the No. 1 seeds from Wake Forest, who were the only at-large team to be selected for the draw, were able to stake out a 5-1 lead in the tiebreaker and hold on from there.
In the second set, Forman and Parr got the match's first break against Johnson, and with Forman, who had dominated on his serve throughout the match, preparing to serve it out, it seemed as if USC had little chance to extend the match. Forman and Parr held a match point at 40-30, but Forman's first serve suddenly deserted him, and four points and four second serves later, the unseeded Farah and Johnson pulled even. Two love holds later it was another tiebreaker, and eventually for Wake Forest, two additional match points at 6-4. Johnson saved one, with a whistling forehand winner in the corner, but Forman put away a volley on the next point to start the celebration.
"It happened last year at NCAAs that we had match points and messed up, so it was really in our minds that we're taking it in our own hands," said Forman, a junior from San Diego. "We've been in the spotlight before in the juniors, but never in college, playing for a national title--it's totally different. I feel now we've experienced it and will be better at it from now on."
The women's doubles final was even closer and more crowd-pleasing than the men's with Fresno State's Renata Kucerkova and Anastasia Petukhova outlasting Notre Dame's Kristy Frilling and Kelcy Tefft 4-6, 6-2, 7-6(5). The unseeded Frilling and Tefft were twice up a break on the No. 3 seeds in the third set, but couldn't hold on, with Frilling broken serving for the match at 5-4. In the tiebreaker, the Fresno State 4-1 advantage evaporated, and then, at 5-5, the two volleys that would decide the match were struck. Tefft, who won the 2007 Indoor title with Brook Buck, missed a routine volley several feet long, to give Fresno State its first match point and Kucerkova made no mistake on her putaway volley to secure the Bulldogs first National Indoor title.
"We were in the semifinals of the NCAAs in May and then made the finals of the All-American," said Petukhova a junior from Russia. "So we thought maybe the third time was the charm."
"It was super intense," said Kucerkova, a junior from the Czech Republic, "but after all the amazing results we had we thought we deserved it."
The consolation finals were completed Sunday morning. In the men's singles, Georgia's Nate Schnugg defeated Bruno Agostinelli of Kentucky in a rematch of the regional final 7-6(4), 7-5. Megan Falcon of LSU took the women's consolation title with a 6-4, 6-3 victory over Georgia Tech's Amanda McDowell. The host team Virginia Cavaliers took the men's doubles consolation tournament, with Dom Inglot and Michael Shabaz defeating small college champions Michael Johnson and Monte Tucker of Auburn-Montgomery 6-2, 6-2. The women's consolation doubles went to Auburn-Montgomery's Delia Sescioreanu and Tereza Ververkova, 6-3, 6-2 winners over USC's Gabriela Niculescu and Maria Sanchez.
For complete results, see the ITA tournament page.
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