Junior Sabine Fuchs in mid-serve during her singles match with BYU’s Morgan Anderson. According to Head Coach Susie Campbell-Gross the whole team must be at the top of their game in order to pull out a win. (Kayla Wong | The Beacon)
By Kyle Cape-Lindelin, Staff Writer -- capelind13@up.edu
Women's tennis continues its rough path in the WCC, falling 0-3 in its latest loss to BYU after a 5-2 home game at the Louisiana-Pacific Tennis Center on Saturday, April 7.
"In order for the team to come out with a win, we will need our best days to happen simultaneously," Head Coach Susie Campbell-Gross said. "We will keep battling and working in hopes that day will come soon."
UP dropped tight matches in most of its singles matches against BYU with freshman Anastasia Polyakova, junior Sabine Fuchs and sophomores Alice Tucker and Emily Mahairas each losing their matches.
"It's tough when a team simply doesn't get enough wins to win the match," sophomore Gabrielle Gorance said. "That's really just the nature of tennis. A team could have one really dominant player, but it doesn't matter because we need the whole team to play great to get the match win."
After dropping the first round 4-6 against BYU freshman Meghan Sheehan-Dizon, junior Valeska Hoath showed off her clutch abilities, dominating the final two rounds 6-1 and 6-4.
"I was very satisfied with my performance," Hoath said. "I can feel myself improving in each match and I'm playing very aggressive which only brings good results."
Hoath also won her doubles match with her partner, Polyakova, 7-6 facing BYU freshman Morgan Anderson and sophomore Desiree Tran.
"Valeska played on the offensive the whole day," Campbell-Gross said. "That's what I love to see. She has a lot of confidence and is very effective right now."
Polykova and Fuchs's matches came down to the last serve in what could have shifted the course of the match for UP had the ball bounced differently.
"When you look at the scores and see how close some of these matches were, you're obviously disappointed," Hoath said. "I know our team is going to be better to finish out the season because we have a great group of girls and we are all working hard and getting stronger the more we play."
To end the already decided match, Gorance handled BYU junior Andie Young in a decisive fashion, winning her rounds 6-2 and 7-6 for her first conference win of the year.
"Gabby (Gorance) played really strong today," Campbell-Gross said. "If some other close matches went the other way for our team, her win would have been the deciding factor in the match. She is showing us continued signs of confidence and mental improvement to not lapse when she gets ahead."
As the conference losses build up, the Pilots will need to take advantage of their final three upcoming home matches to try and make a play at a higher seed in the WCC Tournament beginning April 26-28 in San Diego. UP is slated to host their final non-conference opponent Weber State April 12 at 1 p.m. before home matches against Pepperdine April 13 at noon and Loyola Marymount April 14 with times to be announced.
