Tennis takes on ITA tournament
The Utah State women’s tennis team went out of the Intercollegiate Tennis Association regional tournament with a bang this weekend. Players rallied to make strong showings in the last regular fall season tournament in Las Vegas.
USU senior Monica Abella took to the courts in both singles and doubles play, receiving a bye in the first round in the singles main draw. She was the only Aggie to survive to the third day of play in singles action in the consolation round.
In the doubles main draw, Abella reached the round of 16 with freshman partner Mckenzie Davis. After beating Caroline Scnell and Steffi Rath from Denver University, 8-5, and Emma Verberne and Michelle Okhremchuk from University of Nevada, 8-6, the tandem team eventually lost to Boise State’s Sandy Vo and Marlena Pietzuch in an 8-3 battle.
Other notable Aggies were juniors Jaclyn West and Kristina Voystekhovich. West suffered a back injury at the Boise State Invitational but bounced back to beat University of New Mexico’s Mari Sablina, 6-2, 6-1, in the first round of the main draw in singles action. She fell to University of Utah’s Danielle Flores, 2-6, 3-6, in the second round.
Aggie Voystekhovich continued her successful fall season action in the singles main draw outlasting University of Northern Colorado’s Elizabeth Tapia in a three-set battle. After dropping the first set to Tapia, Voystekhovich eventually took the match, 2-6, 6-4, 6-1.
Voystekhovich went on to sweep Colorado State’s Tori Arneson, 6-3, 6-1, and reach the quarterfinals in the singles main draw, in which she lost to Nives Pavlovic from University of Nevada-Las Vegas in straight sets.
The other Aggies did not fare as well, struggling to get past the first round in both the main draw and the consolation draw.
Junior Mersadi Wilkins lost in the consolation bracket first round to New Mexico State’s Ginet Pinero, 6-0, 6-0.
In similar fashion freshman Kimberly Watts dropped her matches in the main draw and in the consolation bracket to Kaley Schultz of Colorado State, 4-6, 0-6.
Senior Brianna Rowland also struggled at the ITA tournament, losing her first round match in the consolation bracket, 3-6, 2-6, to New Mexico State’s Laura Richardson.
The women’s team will pick up regular action again in their regular spring season match play.
USU Men’s Tennis Rolls Through Tournament
Utah State’s men’s tennis team rolled at the University of Utah’s Regional Invitational tournament this weekend. The Aggies finished strong in their last fall-season tournament, marking up several double-match wins and improving singles play.
Increased depth of fresh talent benefited the team after the loss of four key players last year. Assistant coach Bryan Marchant commented on the hardship of losing those players from last year.
“Our team is young,” Marchant said. “Last year we lost a lot of experience. But we have gained a lot of new talent this year and have good team spirit.”
Junior Sven Poslusny leads the team as No. 1 player, along with other returning seniors Nate Ballam and Fredrik Peterson.
New-talent freshman Marcus Fritz was one of the two seeded USU players to enter the tournament, ranked as the sixth seed. Fritz battled with a shoulder injury and ended up dropping out of the singles bracket but continued doubles play.
Posulsny, USU’s third seed, played both singles and doubles brackets with a broken finger. He won his first-round doubles match with freshman partner Matt Sweet, and the duo met teammates Fritz and Peterson in the quarterfinals, in which Fritz and Peterson won the contest, 8-6.
Fritz and Peterson reached the semi-finals in the doubles main draw before losing the U.’s Ace Matias and Alejandro Medenilla, 8-1.
Marchant notes the efforts of USU against the tough competition but feels there is room for improvement.
“Our effort was good, we played hard,” Marchant said. “We weren’t 100 percent this tournament, but we still want to focus on finishing matches and staying tough in close points.”
Notable play came from the doubles team of Ballem and Curran Wearmouth. Ballem and Wearmouth breezed past Scott Hintze and Peter Stromer-Pelio of Weber State University, 8-1, in the semi-finals. The two faced another Weber pairing of David Hintze and Caio Poitern in the finals, pulling out the win, 8-5.
Wearmouth played notably in singles action as well. Wearmouth won the last two sets over Weber’s Poitern, 7-5, 6-2, after dropping the first set, 0-6.
Marchant said Wearmouth had tenacity in the tough match.
“Wearmouth lost that first set, was down in the second set, but he stayed mentally tough and pulled it out,” Marchant said. “(It was) just a good comeback win for him.”
Marchant said he felt that the team played well this weekend, showing experience and mental toughness.
“We had some pretty good results. Our freshmen did well, played tough matches,” Marchant said. “It was a decent performance — not our greatest tournament, but still a positive.”
Next week the Aggies compete in the Intercollegiate Tennis Association’s Regional tournament, their last outing of the fall season.
– mega.bodi@aggiemail.usu.edu