ARLINGTON, Texas – Tarleton Women's Tennis is title match bound.
The No. 2 seed Texans are one match away from winning the first NCAA Division I conference tournament across all of Tarleton Athletics. On Friday they defeated No. 6 seed New Mexico State 4-1 in the WAC Tournament semifinals to advance to the WAC Tournament championship match against No. 4 seed Grand Canyon on Saturday at 9 a.m. CT at the Arlington Tennis Center.
"This is a historic moment for us and for Tarleton Athletics," head coach
Elianne Douglas-Miron said. "Everything we did this year was working towards this exact moment. Winning the doubles point helped propel us in singles. New Mexico State fought hard. I knew they wouldn't back down in singles and they sure didn't. We had to step up, play our game style, manage the nerves and go win our matches.
"I am so proud of the effort today and we are looking to make history again tomorrow," Douglas-Miron added.
The Texans have now advanced to consecutive conference title matches that they have been eligible for, although this will be their first title bout since 2019. Due to their NCAA Division I reclassification process, Tarleton was unable to participate in the WAC Tournament in both 2022 and 2021, and the 2020 Lone Star Conference Tournament was canceled due to the COVID-19 pandemic.
Although they have made multiple conference tournament title matches in their history, Tarleton Women's Tennis has never won a conference tournament.
This was the second time Tarleton (17-6, 7-2 WAC) defeated New Mexico State (11-14, 4-5 WAC) this season. The Texans have now won six straight matches, their longest winning streak of the season, and they improved to 10-4 away from Stephenville.
Although the score (4-1) was the same as their quarterfinals win over Seattle U, the Texans faced a bit more adversity in Friday's win against the Aggies.
Tarleton won a very competitive doubles point, with tight back-and-forth matches on Courts 1 and 3. On Court 2,
Elsa Boisson and
Celia Vaudiau cruised 6-1 over Miranda Bishard and Bella Nguyen. On Court 1,
Martha Makantasi and
Ximena Morales stormed back from down 5-3 to put the match into a tiebreaker, but Anna Pinaieva and Lisa Zhu held off the Texan pair 7-6(7-3). In the doubles point deciding match on Court 3, both duos kept it as tight as possible. Tarleton's
Emma Persson and
Clara Sobius prevailed 7-6(8-6) over Valeriia Ivanovskaia and Dora Kurdi to give the Texans an early 1-0 lead.
In singles, Tarleton took four first sets out of the six matches, but after jumping ahead 3-1 in the team score, the first nerve-wracking moments of the WAC Tournament charged through the purple and white crowd.
Three matches concluded quickly, the first one in the top flight, as Pinaieva beat Persson 6-1 6-2. Shortly thereafter, Tarleton won two matches nearly at the same time, first with Boisson winning on Court 3 6-2 6-3 over Ivanovskaia, then Vaudiau defeated Nguyen on Court 6 6-3 6-1. Boisson improved her team-best singles record to 17-4, with a team-best nine straight singles wins. Vaudiau won her eighth straight singles match to improve to 10-4 this year.
Leading 3-1 on the team scoreboard, Tarleton had taken the first set in two of the final three matches, but the Aggies refused to go away. New Mexico State was near a win on Court 4 and had won the second set on Court 2 to tie it, but Sobius took care of business after trailing 4-5 in the second set to win on Court 5.
Sobius defeated Nishimura 6-0 7-5 in the No. 5 position, maintaining her composure through a rare deficit plus a slow style of play with continuous empty serve throws by the Aggies player. Sobius improved to 16-6 on the year with her fifth straight win, clinching Tarleton's semifinals win and sending the purple and white to the championship match.
Two unfinished matches were on Courts 2 and 4. Tarleton's Makantasi was barely ahead of Zhu 6-4 3-6 1-0 on Court 2, and New Mexico State's Bishard was near a win on Court 4 against Morales 6-4 5-3.
Tarleton will now meet GCU in the WAC Tournament championship match on Saturday at 9 a.m. CT at the Arlington Tennis Center. The Texans defeated the Lopes 4-3 in their lone meeting this season on April 6 in Stephenville.
There are no tickets required to attend the match, the event is free and open to the public. Tarleton will also live stream the event, found
here, and there will be live scoring, found
here.
