Poets overpowered by big hitting Texas Tyler 8-1

Photo by: Tony Leon/ActionWestPhotography.com

WHITTIER, Calif. – The Whittier College women's tennis team after coming off a 9-0 victory over Northwestern (IA) was stunned by the power hitting and aggressive play of the Patriots of Texas Tyler.

Whittier drops to 2-4, 0-1 SCIAC, while Texas Tyler improves to 5-2. 

The No. 1 and No. 3 doubles teams for Whittier held early breaks in their respective sets but were unable to hold on as they lost 8-4 and 8-5, each respectively. 

The No. 2 team of Rachel Sugiyama and Adrienne Hamada had a chance to serve out the set gaining the first point for the Poets but Hamada was broken at 7-6 and the Patriots went on to hold and break Sugiyama to win 9-7 helping Texas Tyler take a 3-0 lead into singles competition. 

The match of the day belonged to sophomore Chloe Dredge who at No. 2 singles moved beautifully across the court while hitting a handful of unforced errors to pull off the 6-4, 6-1 victory.

Hamada made a strong comeback at No. 3 singles despite dropping the first set combating a very strong and aggressive player just to fall in the third set tiebreaker 10-7. 

Kady Oliker the lone senior starter on the Poet squad also competed well and narrowly missed opportunities to break early but was unable to capitalize on them as she fell in straight sets 7-5, 6-4. 

Freshman Benay Weintraub who led in both sets 5-2 could not hold off her opponents' big momentum swings in both sets despite having multiple set points, but Head Coach David Bojalad is optimistic and says that she "continues to look more and more comfortable and is improving with every college match."      

"We were closer than the score would indicate," said Bojalad, "We had opportunities to win at any of the doubles positions as well as at 3,4,and 5 singles.  In the end, however, their power brand of tennis was too much for us." 

The Purple & Gold look to bounce back as they take on Rochester (N.Y.) simultaneously with the men's match on Thursday, March 15 beginning at 4pm.     

Doubles:

1.            Friesenhahn/Hermsdorf (UT) def. Serylo/Dredge (WC) 8-4

2.            Payne/Blundell (UT) def. Hamada/Sugiyama 9-7

3.            Albro/Wilkins (UT) def. Oliker/Weintraub (WC) 8-5

Singles:

1.            A. Friesenhahn (UT) def. L. Serylo (WC) 6-2, 6-2

2.            C. Dredge (WC) def. J. Blundell (UT) 6-4, 6-1

3.            S. Hermsdorf (UT) def. A. Hamada (WC) 6-3, 1-6, (10-7)

4.            J. Payne (UT) def. K. Oliker (WC) 7-5, 6-4

5.            B. Trich (UT) def. B. Weintraub (WC) 7-5, 7-6 (3)