CORAL GABLES, Fla. – The No. 21 ranked UCF women's tennis team is moving on to the second round of the NCAA Tournament after sweeping Alabama, 4-0 Friday morning at the Neil Schiff Tennis Center in Coral Gables, Florida. The Knights have now successfully advanced past the first round of the big dance in four straight appearances.
"I'm super proud of the team today," said head coach Bryan Koniecko. "We knew it was going to be a tough match – Alabama has had a great year and there are no bad teams in this tournament. We had to give everything got and were pretty resilient in some big moments today which helped us get through."
The Knights began the day by clinching the doubles point after UCF's No. 48 ranked doubles tandem of Evgeniya Levashova and Marie Mattel defeated Alabama's No. 52 ranked pair of Anna Parkhomenko and Petra Sedlackova, 6-4 on court one to put the Knights out in front. Meanwhile, on court two, the UCF duo of Sophia Biolay and Nandini Sharma fended off Loudmilla Bencheikh and Anne Marie Hiser in the tie-breaker to win 7-6.
Up 1-0 in the match early, the Knights kept that momentum rolling into the singles segment, winning five of six sets to start.
Alabama didn't go down without a fight, taking the first set on court two against UCF's Noel Saidenova and three of the second wave of sets, but Biolay and Jaleesa Leslie took down their opponents in just two sets to give the Knights a 3-0 advantage in the match, and Sharma finished off her opponent, 6-2 to secure the sweep for the Black and Gold.
The sweep marked the seventh of the season for the Black and Gold.
UCF advances to a 6-3 record in the NCAA Tournament under Koniecko. The team has made it to the big dance in four of his five full seasons with the Black and Gold, reaching the postseason in four consecutive tries.
Up next, the Knights will face No. 9 Miami in the Round of 32 at 1 p.m. Saturday at the Neil Schiff Tennis Center in Coral Gables, Florida. The Black and Gold are looking to advance to their third straight Sweet 16.
"Miami is a great team and they've had a great season so far," said Koniecko. "We're going to have to play them at their place so that's not going to be an easy challenge. We've faced them once here already this season and lost to them, so I think we're going to try to learn from that experience and try to prepare the best we can for tomorrow."
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