MOBILE, Ala.- The Ave Maria University women's tennis team saw their season come to an end in heartbreaking fashion in the NAIA Women's Tennis Championship on Tuesday, as the Gyrenes lost three matches in the third set in a 4-3 defeat at the hands of 17th-seeded University of Saint Katherine in at the Mobile Tennis Center in Alabama. The loss came in Ave Maria's first appearance in the national tournament.
The doubles point went to the Firebirds, who claimed victories at the second and third flights. Chahenda Galal and Ella Marshall earned the first doubles win for USK, 6-2, at the third position, while McKenna Mountain and Evi Shellkens, the fifth ranked doubles team in the West Region, clinched the point with a 6-4 win at the second spot.
The showdown between AMU's eighth-ranked team in the nation, Lara Teodoro and Vitoria Barandas, and USK's number three team in the West, Laura Eugenio De Hilario and Nadine Heckert, at the first flight saw Teodoro and Barandas hold a 5-4 lead when the doubles point was clinched.
Of the first four matches to finish, Ave Maria took three of the four to claim a 3-2 lead in the match. Andrea Rodriguez Oria rallied from a 6-3 loss in the first set to win 3-6, 6-0, 6-1 over the tenth-ranked player in the west in Heckert. Barandas added another three-set win at 6-2, 4-6, 6-0 over Shellkens at the fifth flight, while Kely Oliveira won 7-6, 6-0 over Ashley Duncan. In those first four matches, the lone USK win came from Mountain, 6-4, 4-6, 6-4 over Julia Candiotto.
Needing just one win in the final two matches, the Gyrenes lost a pair of nailbiters. In a battle of nationally ranked players, USK's Eugenio De Hilario defeated Teodoro, winning two tiebreakers in a 7-6, 2-6, 7-6 win. The clinching point was provided by Chahenda Galal, who lost the first set to AMU's Valentine Colin before coming back for wins of 7-5 and 7-6 in the final two sets.
Ave Maria's season ends in the national tournament for the first time in school history, a bid earned partially due to two wins over national top ten teams, coming against fellow national qualifiers SCAD-Savannah and Middle Georgia State, who are both playing in the Sweet 16. The Gyrenes also finished in a tie for third in The Sun Conference, which sent four teams to the round of 16.
