ATHENS, Ga. – The Florida women’s tennis team has made the University of Georgia’s Dan Magill Tennis Complex a home away from home this weekend in the USTA/ITA Women’s Southeast Regional Championships.
Coach Roland Thornqvist’s Gators are guaranteed champions in both singles and doubles today because the championship finals are all-Florida affairs.
Freshmen Olivia Janowicz and Alex Cercone will square off in the singles final, while the doubles teams of sophomore Allie Will and freshman Sofie Oyen will take on junior Joanna Mather and sophomore Caroline Hitimana for the doubles title. Both championship matches will begin at 3 p.m. on Monday.
“We had a fantastic weekend and competed incredibly well,” Thornqvist said. “This was the best I’ve seen our team compete in many years at Florida. We were very resilient, played extremely well at the end of sets and got better each match of the tournament. This really was the best tennis we’ve played in many, many years.”
The winners of both events earn the region’s qualifying spot in the USTA/ITA National Intercollegiate Indoor Championships, which will be held Nov. 4-7 at the USTA-Billie Jean King National Tennis Center in Flushing Meadows, N.Y. This is the second of the individual national championships played during the collegiate season, with the third and final one being the NCAA Championships next May.
Four Gators reached the quarterfinal round, but top-seeded and fifth-ranked Allie Will withdrew from her match against Florida State’s Katie Rybakova, leaving a rested Seminole to play the winner of the match between UF’s Oyen and Janowicz, who took the match against her fellow teammate 6-2, 6-7 (1), 6-1. Janowicz then upended Rybakova, 6-3, 6-4, to reach her first collegiate singles finals. Cercone won each of her first five matches in straight sets during the tournament, including Sunday’s 6-4, 6-3 semifinal victory against Georgia’s Cameron Ellis and the 6-3, 7-6 (5) decision over Georgia’s Maho Kowase in the quarterfinals.
On the doubles courts, Mather and Hitimana took out Miami’s top-seeded and 15th-ranked team of Bianca Eichkorn and Anna Bartenstein, 8-5 to reach the final, while the Gator tandem of Oyen and Will defeated Georgia’s Alexandra Anghelescu and Cameron Ellis, 8-4, in their semifinal match.
ITA/USTA WOMEN’S SOUTHEAST REGIONAL CHAMPIONSHIPS
Dan Magill Tennis Complex / Athens, Ga. / Oct. 23-24, 2010 / Florida results
DOUBLES
Round of 16
Joanna Mather/Carolina Hitimana (UF) def. (29) Caroline Lilley/Sasha Krupina (Georgia Tech), 8-0; (39) Francesca Segarelli/Federica Suess (FSU) def. Alex Cercone/Olivia Janowicz (UF), 8-6; (18) Sofie Oyen/Allie Will (UF) def. Aline Berkenbrock/Melanie Aguirre (North Florida), 8-0.
Quarterfinals
Joanna Mather/Carolina Hitimana (UF) def. Janette Bejlkova/Loreto Alonso Martinez (South Florida), 9-7; (18) Sofie Oyen/Allie Will (UF) def. Gabriela Mejia/Kayla Rizzolo (Miami), 8-3.
Semifinals
Joanna Mather/Carolina Hitimana (UF) def. Bianca Eichkorn/Anna Bartenstein (Miami), 8-5; (18) Sofie Oyen/Allie Will (UF) def. Alexandra Anghelescu/Cameron Ellis (Georgia), 8-4.
Monday’s championship
Joanna Mather/Carolina Hitimana (UF) vs. (18) Sofie Oyen/Allie Will (UF)
SINGLES
Round of 16
(5) Allie Will (UF) def. Jillian O’Neill (Georgia Tech), 6-2, 6-4; Olivia Janowicz (UF) def. (31) Nadja Gilchrist (Georgia), 6-3, 6-3; Sofie Oyen (UF) def. (86) Ecaterina Vasenina (USF), 7-5, 6-3; (30) Irene Rehberger (USF) def. (98) Joanna Mather (UF), 6-4, 6-2; Alex Cercone (UF) def. (14) Bianca Eichkorn (Miami), 7-5, 6-4
Quarterfinals
Katie Rybakova, Florida State def. (5) Allie Will (UF) walkover; Olivia Janowicz (UF) def. Sofie Oyen (UF), 6-2, 6-7 (1), 6-1; Alex Cercone (UF) def. Maho Kowase (Georgia), 6-3, 7-6 (5)
Semifinals
Olivia Janowicz (UF) def. Katie Rybakova (FSU), 6-3, 6-4; Alex Cercone (UF) def. Cameron Ellis (Georgia), 6-4, 6-3.
Monday’s championship
Olivia Janowicz (UF) vs. Alex Cercone (UF)