Tennis team falls to Sooners
The Utah State women’s tennis team fell 6-1 to the Oklahoma Sooners Thursday in Logan. But the Aggie’s loss to the No. 24 ranked Sooners was closer than the score shows.
“It’s good for them to see that they can really compete with [Oklahoma],” Utah State Assistant Coach Andy Madersbacher said.
The lone Aggie win of the afternoon came in the No. 4 singles match as Courtney Anderson beat Jessica Braver 6-4, 5-7, 10-4.
Lindsey Bennion came out strong against the Sooners’ No. 1 singles player, Irina Lykina, losing 7-5 after coming back from being down 5-2.
“I didn’t know how she played,” Bennion said of her singles opponent. “I didn’t see her warm up so Jill and I exchanged some words.”
At the start of the second set Bennion said she was caught off guard as Lykina jumped out to a 5-0 lead. Bennion lost the set 6-3 after a break and two holds of serve got her to within two at 5-3.
“Lindsey didn’t play up to her potential,” Madersbacher said. “She went for too much because she was playing so well.”
At No. 2 singles Jill Smith lost 6-3, 6-2 but she kept things close as rally after rally went on for extended periods of time but Oklahoma’s Beth Griffin.
At the No. 5 singles spot Andrea Barker lost after a valiant effort 6-4, 6-7 (4-7), 10-4.
The doubles teams started off the match with No. 1 and 2 doubles losing after some very closely contested games 8-3 and 8-2 respectively. The No. 3 doubles combo of Jill Smith and Lauren Monson lost a close 8-6 match which could have gone differently.
“We had five or six games where we had game point,” Madersbacher said. “So it could have gone totally different.”
On Tuesday the women beat Idaho State in Pocatello, Idaho 7-0.
Smith won 4-6, 7-6, 11-9 against Armine Sarkavagyan. The other Aggies all won by at least 6-2 in their sets except for one set which was 6-4.
The women are now 2-2 after this match. Their next match will be on Feb. 18 against Mesa State in Logan.
-krn@cc.usu.edu