Florida Gators
Alabama
No. 5 Women's Tennis Blanks No. 20 Alabama, 7-0
Saturday, March 29, 2003 | Women's Tennis
The fifth-ranked Florida women's tennis team showed no signs of a letdown after Wednesday's emotional 4-3 upset over top-ranked Duke, disposing of No. 20 Alabama 7-0 on Friday evening at Linder Stadium at Ring Tennis Complex.
The Gators (18-2, 6-1 SEC) opened the dual match with dominating performances on all three doubles courts, winning 24 of the 26 games played in the 8-game pro-sets, with the Gators holding serve on every occasion. UF's No. 2 duo of Alexis Gordon and Julie Rotondi rallied from a 15-40 deficit in the opening game to win the first game and needed just 35 minutes to polish off Ashley Bentley and Nathalie Koppelle 8-1. Florida was serving for the matches on courts 1 and 3 at the exact same time and it was the No. 1 duo of Jennifer Magley and Zerene Reyes who took the clinching point honors after Magley lost just one point on her serve in the final game to serve out the 8-0 shutout against Sophie Cremers and Robin Stephenson. Lindsay Dawaf and Julia Scaringe followed one minute later with an 8-1 win over Stefanie Leung and Mary Lord-Andrade.
Alabama (14-4, 4-3 SEC), which took the court without its top player Millie Begovic, proved no match for the Gators in singles, as well. Florida took the first game on all six courts, with three of those being service breaks.
"I thought we were a better team than Alabama and I was happy to see that there was no loss of concentration following Wednesday's win over Duke," UF head coach Roland Thornqvist said. "We had a couple goals in doubles that we wanted to achieve and all three teams were focused on those areas. It will help us become more competitive in doubles. In singles, most of us played well and got of the court quickly, which was important because on Sunday we play our fifth match in 10 days."
On Sunday, the Gators entertain Auburn beginning at 1 p.m. Admission to all regular season matches at the Ring Tennis Complex is free.
Alexis Gordon, who provided the clinching match heroics in Wednesday's upset over Duke with an exciting three-setter, didn't show any signs of an emotional letdown defeating Nathalie Koppelle 6-2, 6-1 at the No. 5 position. Gordon's 52-minute victory, that gave Florida a 2-0 lead in the dual match, was her 11th consecutive win.
UF junior Julie Rotondi was involved in a battle at the No. 4 position against Ashley Bentley. The match opened with consecutive breaks and the two competitors played through multiple duces each game. The difference came in the fifth game, where Rotondi broke Bentley in an extremely long game, which seemed to break Bentley's spirit. From that game on, Rotondi dominated play and needed just one hour and seven minutes for the 6-2, 6-1 victory that clinched the dual match win for the Gators.
Julia Scaringe bounced back from her tough three-set loss on Wednesday to Duke's second-ranked Kelly McCain with an impressive 6-1, 6-4 victory over Sophie Cremers at the No. 1 spot. UF's lone senior won the first three games, using one break, before Cremers got on the board with a break of her own to spark a three-break spree. However, Scaringe took the last of those to take a 5-1 advantage and then served out for the opening set. She broke Cremers at love to begin the second and jumped out to a 2-0 lead behind her serve. The two held in their next respective games, before a string of four straight breaks brought Scaringe's led to 5-4. But the hard-serving righty polished off the match in the next game to claim the straight set victory in one hour and three minutes and place UF within one win of capturing the dual match.
Zerene Reyes regrouped strongly from her first dual match loss of the season, which she incurred on Wednesday, winning the opening seven games of her No. 2 singles match against Robin Stephenson en route to a 6-0, 6-1 victory. The Gator sophomore used precision ground strokes to move Stephenson from baseline to baseline throughout the contest, as Reyes improved her dual match record to 17-1 this season.
Gator freshman Boglarka Berecz won her ninth straight singles match with a 6-2, 6-3 victory against Natalie McElveen at the No. 6 spot. The first set featured six breaks of serve, with Berecz taking the last one to close the opening set. McElveen began the second set with a break, and Berecz trailed a deceiving 3-1 in the second set, but it was just that one break that separated the two competitors. The two played even until Berecz got the match back on serve in the sixth game and then earned another in the eighth game before serving out the win.
Junior Lindsay Dawaf provided the finishing touches on UF's sixth shutout of an SEC opponent this year, after defeating Mary Lord-Andrade 6-3, 6-3 in one hour and 18 minutes. The first set featured seven breaks of serve, with Dawaf beginning and ended the set with one. She settled down in the opening games of the second set and took a 3-1 lead. Dawaf earned a second break in the sixth game to lead 5-1, but couldn't serve out, as Lord-Andrade won the next games. However, Dawaf regrouped and polished off the win on her serve to secure the straight-set shutout for the Gators.
College Women's Tennis
Linder Stadium at Ring Tennis Complex
Gainesville, FL
Friday, March 28, 2003
Final Score: Florida 7, Alabama 0
Doubles
1. Jennifer Magley/Zerene Reyes (37), UF, d. Sophie Cremers/Robin Stephenson, UA 8-0*
2. Alexis Gordon/Julie Rotondi, UF, d. Ashley Bentley/Nathalie Koppelle, UA 8-1
3. Lindsay Dawaf/Julia Scaringe, UF, d. Stefanie Leung/Mary Lord-Andrade, UA 8-1
Singles
1. Julia Scaringe (41), UF, d. Sophie Cremers, UA 6-1, 6-4
2. Zerene Reyes (29), UF, d. Robin Stephenson, UA 6-1, 6-1
3. Lindsay Dawaf (22), UF, d. Mary Lord-Andrade, UA 6-3, 6-3
4. Julie Rotondi (30), UF, d. Ashley Bentley, UA 6-2, 6-1
5. Alexis Gordon (14), UF, d. Nathalie Koppelle, UA 6-2, 6-1
6. Boglarka Berecz, UF, d. Natalie McElveen, UA 6-2, 6-3
*Clinching doubles & dual match point
END OF REPORT
