ANN ARBOR, Mich. – The No. 12 UCF women's tennis team prevailed in a tight contest as they defeated the Utah Utes 4-3 in their opening match of ITA Kickoff Weekend.
"I'm very proud of our toughness and how the team stepped up today when they needed to come through," said UCF head coach Bryan Koniecko, "Marie down a set and a break showed how great a competitor she is. Domenika had a great day in singles and doubles, too. Utah deserves a ton of credit, they played a great doubles point and took it to us in the beginning. Coach Mortera is having that team compete like crazy and they made it tough on us today."
Utah came out strong in doubles play. Evgeniya Levashova and Domenika Turkovic fought off the initial surge from the Utes, beating Katya Hersh and Anya Lamoreaux 6-2 on court three. Unphased, Utah kept pushing as No. 24 Whitney Hekking and Madison Tattini defeated No. 3 Rebeka Stolmar and Marie Mattel 6-3 at the top doubles spot. Emily
Dush and Madeline Lamoreaux clinched the doubles point for Utah moments later, edging Valeriya Zeleva and Nadja Bay Christians 6-4 on court two.
Singles play saw hard fought first sets across all courts as the Knights and Utes split the first sets evenly at three apiece.
No. 40 Zeleva got the Knights on the board first as she triumphed over Madeline Lamoreaux 6-1, 6-4 at the No. 2 singles spot. Shortly after, Turkovic locked up court four as she beat Lindsay Hung 6-1, 6-2 on court four.
Utah evened the match and eventually pull into the lead with wins on six and five. Anya Lamoreaux topped Valentina Martin 6-1, 6-0 just minutes before Dush edged Sara Culbertson 6-1, 6-4.
Levashova cruised through her singles match at the top spot in the lineup, beating Tattini 6-3, 6-0 to tie the match at 3-3.
The fate of the match rested on court three, where No. 54 Mattel was working her way back from a tight 5-7 first set loss. She went on to win a tight second set before jumping out to a 3-0 lead in the third frame. That was all the momentum Mattel needed to propel her to the finish, defeating Hekking 5-7, 6-4, 6-2 to clinch the match for the Knights.
UP NEXT
The Knights advance to the final of their ITA Kickoff Weekend bracket where they'll face No. 15 Michigan on Sunday at 1 p.m. ET. Michigan earned the right to host ITA Kickoff Weekend for their final team ranking of the 2019 season.
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