ASU opened its 2015 season against UC Davis on Saturday, Jan. 15, 2015, at Whiteman Tennis Center in Tempe. ASU was victorious in the match against UC Davis. (Krista Tillman/ The State Press)The No. 29 ASU tennis team (2-2) is looking for some home cooking this weekend against the BYU Cougars.
The Sun Devils will face a formidable opponent this week in Brigham Young, who checked in at No. 65 in this week's installment of the ITA poll.
The Cougars comes in as an experienced and balanced group, returning eight players who were a part of the previous matchup between these two teams, which then-No. 28 ASU won 4-3 last season in Tempe.
"They gave us a great match last year here," ASU coach Sheila McInerney said. "They’ve basically got the same team back, so we know it’s gonna be a good game."
ASU comes in riding a two-game losing streak, suffering its first home loss of the season in the group's last match against No. 27 Ohio State.
After taking the lead during the doubles session of the match, the team dropped four points during singles. The team has since moved on from the defeat, seeking a chance to get back to its winning ways, particularly through strong performances in practice.
During the long break last week, the Sun Devils used the extra time to emphasize in-game scenarios, playing plenty of simulated matches.
"I think it’s important," McInerney said. "Because usually once your season starts and once we’re in January, you’re pretty used to playing every weekend. Having last weekend off as far as match play and playing dual matches (was important). As far as playing another team, it’s unusual, because usually you keep a routine, so I think it’s been really important these last couple weeks."
McInerney said the live-match style portions of practice as being similar to a basketball team scrimmaging during practice.
"Last weekend, we played what we call a mock dual where we had half of the team as one team and half as another, and have them play against each other. We’ve tried to play some sets this week — two or three sets — to simulate a match. So I think it’s really important that when you have a little bit of time off from play that in your practice you try to get as close to a national match as you can."
After being idle last weekend, McInerney said that her team was doing a good job of taking early command in games, however her team did not finish off its opponents during its last two games. As a result, she added more conditioning work during training sessions in hope of providing her team with the endurance to close out a long match.
"I think it’s been going well," junior Stephanie Vlad said. "It’s been an important aspect to focus on just because we’ve had such a long break. We had focused at the beginning (of the week) on drilling and conditioning, and now as the match gets closer, we’ve been playing a lot more sets."
The team is aware that this match will mark a pivotal point in the early stages of the dual-match campaign, but have not allowed that to deter them from taking a game-by-game approach.
"I think this one will be very important because we did have a close match with them last season and we won," Vlad said. "I think it’ll be good for everyone’s confidence because we’ve had two tough losses in a row."
The match will take place Saturday at 12 p.m. in Tempe.
Reach the reporter at kajone31@asu.edu or follow @kaelenjones on Twitter.
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