Women's Tennis Wins Both On Rainy Sunday in Arlington

ARLINGTON, Texas — The St. Mary's University Women's Tennis team really loves playing at the Arlington Tennis Center. The Rattlers have won the last two Lone Star Conference Tournaments there and continued their success today with two wins despite the rainy weather that plagued the state all day.
 
St. Mary's (5-3) defeated both Ouachita Baptist and #33 Hawai'i Pacific by the score of 4-0 as the teams played postseason clinch format due to the inclement weather. The two wins give Director of Tennis Bill Macom 600 career victories. Seventy of those victories have come with the St. Mary's Women's team, while 47 have come with the men's squad.
 
"We finally played better under pressure," said Macom. "The doubles against OBU was a little sluggish, but we had a couple of people put things together in their singles to clinch a quick win."
 
The duo of sophomore Stela Sifuentes (Eagle Pass, Texas) and freshman Janel Ospanova (Karaganda, Kazakhstan) won 6-4 at number three doubles, while junior Karen Kondo (Tokyo, Japan) and freshman Selina Wu (San Gabriel, Calif.) won 6-3 on court one to clinch the point for the Gold and Blue.
 
Three of the four carried the momentum into singles as Wu won 6-4, 6-1 at number two, Ospanova won 6-0, 6-3 at number three and Sifuentes posted a 6-2, 6-1 victory at number five for the shutout win.
 
Junior Paula Garrote (Alicante, Spain) led 6-1, 3-2 on court one when the match was finished, while sophomore Alessia Terlizzi (Andria, Italy) also held a 6-2, 4-3 edge.
 
"Against HPU, third doubles played a solid set to win quickly," Macom said. "We were fortunate that number one finished strong, playing more aggressively in the tiebreaker. It's rare that a team as good as HPU loses the doubles point, so the girls did a great job winning four first sets to keep the momentum going for us."
 
The third tandem was again Ospanova and Sifuentes as they posted a 6-2 victory. Kondo and Wu fought through the tiebreaker, winning 7-2.
 
Kondo only dropped one game at number three, winning 6-0, 6-1. Garrote, who moved up to number one this week, won 6-2, 6-4 setting up Sifuentes for the clinch with her 6-2, 6-3 victory at number six.
 
The Rattlers return home to host Northeastern State on Tuesday at 2 p.m. The team then turns its attention to Lone Star Conference play as they host #5 Midwestern State and #11 Lubbock Christian over the weekend.