Quartet of Gators Collect SEC W-Tennis Honors
Tuesday, April 21, 2009 | Women's Tennis
The University of Florida's Marrit Boonstra, Joanna Mather, Anastasia Revzina and Jessica Alexander all were honored by the Southeastern Conference women's tennis coaches, who announced their postseason awards Tuesday afternoon through the league office.
Boonstra, Mather and Revzina each were named First Team All-SEC, with Boonstra one of four players who were unanimous selections to the award. Alexander earned a spot on the second team. Mather also was selected to the All-Freshman Team, which is in its second year of existence.
Boonstra, who played the No. 5 and No. 6 spots in last year's dual match lineup, is playing the No. 1 singles position for the first time and is having the best season of her career, posting a team-best 18-2 dual match singles record all at the No. 1 position, with a 9-2 mark in league play. She has a team-leading 30-7 overall singles record, including an 18-5 ledger versus ranked opponents. Entering the year, the highest-ranked opponent Boonstra had ever defeated was ranked No. 46; this year has two wins over the No. 6-ranked player and two additional wins over top-25 players.
After playing the Nos. 5 & 6 singles positions last year, Revzina improved her game enough to secure the No. 2 spot this season, where she is 13-4 overall in dual matches, including a 7-2 record against SEC foes. She sports a 21-9 overall record, with 10 wins vs. ranked opponents. Revzina provided clinching dual match wins over No. 2 Georgia and Vanderbilt.
Mather's transformation from the fall to the end of the regular season has been nothing short of remarkable. She began her career losing four straight, but ended the regular season on a nine-match win streak, all playing at No. 3 dual match position where she was 9-1 in SEC action.
Alexander joined the team in January and never missed a beat, making her way from the No. 5 to the No. 4 dual match singles position, where she played the final 15 matches of the regular season. She is 10-4 overall at the No. 4 spot, with an 8-3 mark in conference play. Alexander also played the Nos. 1 & 2 doubles positions, with nine of the matches coming at the top spot.
The No. 15 Gators earned the No. 4 seed in the SEC Tournament, which gets underway on Thursday at the Billingsley Tennis Center in Fayetteville, Ark. Florida received one of the four first-round byes and awaits the winner of the match between Vanderbilt and Mississippi State in the quarterfinal round on Friday at 11:30 a.m. ET (10:30 a.m. CT).
A complete list of the 2009 All-SEC Women's Tennis awards follows:
All-SEC First Team
Aurelija Miseviciute, Arkansas*
Fani Chifchieva, Auburn*
Alex Haney, Auburn
Marrit Boonstra, Florida*
Joanna Mather, Florida
Anastasia Revzina, Florida
Nadja Gilchrist, Georgia
Monika Dancevic, Georgia
Chelsey Gullickson, Georgia
Megan Falcon, LSU*
Kristi Boxx, Ole Miss
Ana Marija Zubori, South Carolina
Caitlin Whoriskey, Tennessee
All-SEC Second Team
Tiffany Welcher, Alabama
Ela Kaluder, Arkansas
Anouk Tigu, Arkansas
Jessica Alexander, Florida
Cameron Ellis, Georgia
Yvette Hyndman, Georgia
Naoko Ueshima, Georgia
Karen Nijssen, Ole Miss
Gira Schofield, South Carolina
Samantha Orlin, Tennessee
Natalie Pluskota, Tennessee
Catherine Newman, Vanderbilt
Jackie Wu, Vanderbilt
All-Freshman Team
Joanna Mather, Florida
Chelsey Gullickson, Georgia*
Nadja Gilchrist, Georgia
Kristi Boxx, Ole Miss
Natalie Pluskota, Tennessee
*unanimous
Coach of the Year: Mike Patrick and Sonia Hahn-Patrick, Tennessee
Player of the Year: Aurelija Miseviciute, Arkansas
Freshman of the Year: Chelsey Gullickson, Georgia
Scholar-Athlete of the Year: Aurelija Miseviciute, Arkansas
A tie in first-team and second-team voting added an additional player to each team.
-UF-
