On a picturesque, cloudy day at Whiteman Tennis Center in Tempe, ASU women’s tennis (9-5, 2-2) upset No. 38 Oregon (10-6, 3-1) 4-1, earning a must needed late-season conference win.
Head coach Sheila McInerney was not pleased with her team’s energy in doubles after a 6-1 win over Northern Arizona University, and it appears that players got the message.
“Oregon is a good team and we won the doubles handily,” McInerney said. “We basically told the kids that we need to have a lot more energy. Your back in the conference, and I think Oregon’s win over USC certainly got their attention. I think the kids were ready to play today, and we came out and played well in the doubles.”
The team earned their third-straight victory and improved to 7-2 at Whiteman this season. ASU will play their final three regular season contests in front of the home crowd against USC, UCLA and Arizona respectively.
Junior Kelley Anderson and freshman Savannah Slaysman were on and off court two quickly, defeating senior Marlou Kluiving and freshman Julia Eshet, 6-0. Senior Kassidy Jump and sophomore Sammi Hampton clinched the doubles point for the Sun Devils on court three, defeating junior Nia Rose and freshman Rifanty Kahfiani, 6-2. Jump and Hampton have now won 19 of their last 21 matches. Senior Alex Osborne and junior Nicole Fossa-Huergo, ranked No. 58, did not finish their match.
Heading into the match, Anderson said doubles was a major focus of practice, and it showed once the match started.
“We both had a goal to have our energy up from the start and to make sure we both said come on after points,” Anderson said. “Whenever we have energy, we always play a lot better.”
With the doubles point secured, competition moved to singles. ASU quickly seized momentum, with Hampton, Anderson and Fossa-Huergo each claiming the first set, 6-0 on courts two through four respectively, and never looked back.
“I was really happy for our kids to sort of pull out a tough win. Obviously, it was a lot closer than 4-1," McInerney said. "We won a lot of first sets but the other team battled back. We knew Oregon would be tough, they are well coached and compete hard.”
Anderson gave the Sun Devils a 2-0 lead with a 6-0, 6-1 win over Rose. Hampton had to battle in the second set, but eventually captured her second straight singles win, defeating Tobita 6-0 and 7-6 in a tiebreak. The Vancouver, Washington native put her team ahead 3-0.
Jump was tested on court one, but clinched the match for ASU on a deciding 40-40 point, 7-6, 6-3.
“It was nice to see Kass win the decider,” McInerney said. “She has had a couple of tough losses this year, so for her to win the deciding match is sort of appropriate and her birthday is tomorrow.”
Matches played with no-ad scoring, meaning once a point reached deuce, the next winner would decide the point and in Jump’s case, the match.
“It was tough because again I had to get out of my comfort zone,” Jump said. “I’m starting to be able to handle it more. Freshman, sophomore even a little bit of junior year, that match would have been tough for me. My confidence has grown and I just got to play my game. If she played back, I just had to go after it and stay aggressive.”
Slaysman grabbed an early lead in the first set on court six, but Kluiving came back to win and then took control in the second set. That was ASU’s only loss of the day.
Before the match started, both teams decided to play a clinch-clinch format. As a result, the remaining two matches were abandoned. Fossa-Huego was into the third set on court four, and senior Gussie O’Sullivan was up a set and down in the second set on court seven.
ASU earned their second upset win in the last nine days. With the Pac-12 championships coming up, finishing the regular season strong is necessary. McInerney always will take it one match and one opponent at a time, but the Sun Devils are bidding for a 30th straight NCAA tournament appearance this season.
“To go back into the Pac-12 schedule and play a team that was ranked ahead of us, we really wanted it,” Jump said.
Up Next:
Next weekend, ASU will hit the road for the final time this season. On Friday, the Sun Devils are in Pullman to face the Washington State Cougars at 1:30 p.m. MST. After an off day on Saturday, the team will make the four-hour trek to Seattle to butt heads with the Washington Huskies.
Reach the reporter at jpjacqu1@asu.edu or follow @joejacquezaz on Twitter.
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