ORLANDO, Fla. – The No. 8, top-seeded UCF women's tennis team punched it's ticket to the American Athletic Conference semifinals as they advanced past eighth-seeded South Florida 4-1.
"It was nice to get a win and advance today, obviously that is what the postseason is about," said head coach Bryan Koniecko. "Credit to South Florida, they fought hard and gave us a good match. We were fortunate to escape from that one and advance and play a good Houston team. As the tournament goes on, we're going to have to play better and better. Hopefully we can find another gear tomorrow against another good team because we'll need it."
The Knights jumped out to big leads on court two of the three doubles courts. Ksenia Kuznetsova and Valeriya Zeleva were the first to earn a victory, beating Grace Eland and Laura Pellicer 6-1 at the top spot in the lineup. Courts two and three were battling for the clinching match in doubles. In the end, it was Nandini Sharma and Rebeka Stolmar who topped Grace Schumacher and Margriet Timmermans. Court two went unfinished but saw Nadja Bay Christians and Evgeniya Levashova leading Alexandria Mjos and Evelyne Tiron 5-4.
South Florida began singles with a lead but lost their edge midway through the first frame. The Knights went on to take five of six first sets.
The points started going up on the scoreboard soon after as No. 30 Stolmar earned a 6-4, 6-1 on court one. The UCF captain advances to 11-6 this season and 4-1 at the top spot in the lineup.
Sharma got the Knights one point away from clinching the match as she was victorious on court six by a count of 6-2, 6-2 over Lucia Garrigues. Sharma has won eight straight matches and improves to 9-1 this season.
South Florida's lone point of the match came via court two as Schumacher defeated No. 99 Levashova 6-2, 6-3.
The stud freshman Jaleesa Leslie earned the clinching point as she topped Timmermans on court five by a score of 6-4, 6-3. Leslie leads the team in victories with a record of 13-4 and has won eight of her last ten.
UCF controlled the remaining two courts that were unfinished as Marie Mattel won her first set against Mjos 7-6 (7-2) and was tied in the second stanza 2-2 on court four. Kuznetsova won her first set easily over Tiron and was in a second set tiebreaker 6-0, 6-6 (6-6).
UP NEXT
The Knights will face fifth-seeded Houston in the semifinal round at 11 a.m. The two sides have met six times in program history splitting the decisions evenly. It will be the first time UCF faces the Cougars since April 19, 2017 when they met in The American conference tournament.
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