No. 28 SMU Women’s Tennis Downs Louisville and Louisiana-Lafayette

DALLAS (SMU) – The No. 28 SMU Women’s Team defeated both Louisiana-Lafayette and Louisville on Sunday at the Turpin Tennis Center to improve to 7-2 on the season. The Mustangs claimed the wins by scores of 5-1 and 7-0, respectively.

The morning matches with ULL took under two hours to complete since the two teams played only the singles matches.

The Mustangs jumped out to a quick 2-0 lead as both Marta Lesniak and Aleksandra Malyarchikova wasted little time in closing out their opponents.

Malyarchikova was off the court in less than 30 minutes when she downed Milou Israel, 6-0, 6-0 at No. 4. Lesniak, the nation’s number two singles player, finished moments later when she beat Audrey Wooland, 6-2, 6-2 at the top singles line.

Edyta Cieplucha made the score 3-1 in favor of SMU with an easy 6-0, 6-1 at No. 2 over Julie Mazinova and Ashley Turpin was next to finish when she clinched the win over Sandra Ahlqvist 6-4, 6-0 at No. 5.

The final margin of 5-1 was secured when Heather Stainbauer outlasted Briggitt Marcovich at No. 3 in a tight 7-6, 6-4 battle.

Against the Cardinals, SMU kept up their momentum from the morning and come out strong in doubles play to claim the early 1-0 lead winning at all three positions.

Lesniak and Malyarchikova raced out to a 7-1 lead and eventually closed out the No. 33 pair of Julia Fellerhoff and Becca Shine, 8-4 at No. 1. The duo improved their record to 4-3 on the spring and recorded their first win against a nationally ranked opponent.

Minutes later at No. 2 Cieplucha and Steinbauer dispatched of Amelia Harris and Stafanie Villejuan, 8-3, while Turpin and Shahzoda Hatamova took out Sarah Miller and Gabbrielle Duncan, 8-4 at the No. 3 line to close out play.

   

Cieplucha and Steinbauer are now 6-1 this season and Turpin and Hatamova improved to 5-3.

Singles play saw much of the same dominance as the team once again raced out to a commanding lead.

Lesniak improved to 6-2 this spring and 24-5 overall when she dispatched of Fellerhoff at No. 1 6-3, 6-1. The junior was down 3-0 to begin the match, but regrouped to win 12 of the next 13 games and cruise to the win.

Cieplucha continued her steady play and pushed the advantage to 3-0 in favor of SMU with her 6-4, 6-3 win over Shine at No. 2. The native of Poland is now 6-2 at the No. 2 position for the Mustangs.

Turpin clinched the match once again for SMU at No. 6 when she defeated Miller 6-2, 6-0. Turpin evened her spring record at 4-4 and has not lost at match at the Turpin Tennis Center all spring.

Steinbauer ran her record to 6-2 this spring at the No. 3 line and extended the SMU lead with her 6-2, 6-1 win over Kaysara Mandry, while Malyarchikova claimed her seventh win against just one defeat when she triumphed over Harris at No. 5, 6-3, 6-3.

Hatamova, who was battling the flu, sealed the sweep for SMU with her gutty performance at No. 4. The sophomore rallied to claim the first set against Sonia Bokhari, 7-6, and then garnered the strength to pull out a strong 6-1 win in the second set.

”I thought we came out and played really well and with some high energy even though we have a few girls on the team who are under the weather,” said head coach Lauren Longbotham Meisner. “The girls really came out and fought hard and got some quality wins. I think it was good to see us rebound from the Stanford loss as well. Louisville is a tough scrappy team and they have played close matches with some really good ranked opponents recently, so we knew we had to come out ready to play our game. We definitely had the energy today to get the job done. With good weather on the way this week, it will be nice to get some quality practice in before our match with LSU next Sunday.”

SMU returns to action Sunday, February 19th when they host LSU at Turpin Tennis Center on the campus of SMU. First serve for the match with the Tigers is set for Noon.

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