Mississippi State Men Beat Ohio State, Michigan and Oklahoma State Complete Women's Quarterfinals with 4-3 Victories; Ekstrand and Akli Reach USTA Pro Circuit Boca Raton W35 Final
The NCAA Division I men's and women's quarterfinals are set after seven Super Regional matches today, with one upset in the men's five matches and both women's matches decided by a 4-3 score.
A day after the fourth-seeded Ohio State women were eliminated, the fifth-seeded Ohio State men were dealt another rare loss in Columbus, with No. 12 Mississippi State defeating the Buckeyes 4-2. Mississippi State is heading to the quarterfinals for the first time since 2018, while it's only the fourth time in the past 21 years that Ohio State will not be among the Elite Eight, according to John Parsons @No-ad No-Problem. The Buckeyes also lost the Big Ten conference final match in Columbus last month.
Defending champion and No. 2 seed TCU avenged its Big 12 conference tournament semifinal loss to Central Florida with a convincing 4-0 victory, and No. 3 seed Texas blanked No. 14 Tennessee 4-0. In addition to the Ohio State-Mississippi State match, two others were 4-2, with No. 7 Virginia winning the highly anticipated contest with No. 10 Arizona and No. 8 Columbia beating No. 9 North Carolina State by that score.
In last year's Super Regional, unbeaten and No. 1 seed Oklahoma State was dealt a shocking loss, with Tennessee earning a 4-2 upset over the Cowgirls, who were serving as hosts for the final three rounds of the NCAA tournament.
This year Oklahoma State was unseeded, but upset No. 6 Oklahoma in Norman last weekend and beat Stanford 4-3 today to reach their first quarterfinal since 2017.
Michigan is a regular now in the quarterfinals, advancing for the third year in a row thanks to senior Julia Fliegner, who won a roller coaster of a battle over Texas's Sabina Zeynalova 6-4, 5-7, 7-6(1). Fliegner had three match points in the second set that she was unable to convert, and was on the brink herself in the final set serving at 5-5, 0-40, but Zeynalova, who was cramping and serving underhand, couldn't muster much opposition in the tiebreaker.
Saturday's results:
WOMEN:
*Michigan[3] d. Texas[14] 4-3
*Oklahoma State d. Stanford 4-3
*host
MEN:
Mississippi State[12] d. *Ohio State[5] 4-2
*TCU[2] d. Central Florida[15] 4-0
*Virginia[7] d. Arizona[10] 4-2
*Columbia[8] d. NC State[9] 4-2
*Texas[3] d. Tennessee[14] 4-0
*host
The quarterfinal matchups, with times, in Waco next week:
WOMEN: (Thursday May 15)
ALL TIMES EASTERN
Georgia[1] v Duke[8] 11am
North Carolina[5] v LSU[13] 2pm
Michigan[3] v Oklahoma State 8pm
Tennessee[10] v Texas A&M[2] 5pm
MEN: (Friday May 16)
ALL TIMES EASTERN
Wake Forest[1] v Columbia[8] 11am
Mississippi State[12] v Stanford[4] 2pm
Texas[3] v UCLA 8pm
Virginia[7] v TCU[2] 5pm
Monika Ekstrand and Ayana Akli, both unseeded, will meet for the title of the women's USTA Pro Circuit W35 in Boca Raton Florida Sunday.
The 18-year-old Ekstrand defeated Jada Robinson 3-6, 6-3, 6-1 to reach her second W35 final since the beginning of April, while Akli beat No. 4 seed Gergana Topalova of Bulgaria 6-7(6), 6-4, 7-5 in a three-hour and 18-minute marathon.
Top seeds Fiona Crawley(UNC) and Alana Smith(NC State) won the doubles title, beating unseeded Kayla Day and Allura Zamarripa(Texas) 6-4, 6-2 in the final.
At the W50 in Indian Harbour Beach Florida, 15-year-old Kristina Liutova of Russia lost to top seed Arina Rodionova of Australia 7-5, 6-4. Rodionova will play unseeded Lia Karatancheva of Bulgaria for the title Sunday.
No. 4 seeds Haley Giavara(Cal) and Alexandra Osborne(Arizona State) of Australia won the doubles title, beating unseeded Tara Moore of Great Britain and Abigail Rencheli(NC State) 6-3, 3-6, 10-7.
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