Michael Shipma
Sports Editor
The Troy women’s tennis team improved its conference record to 2-1 with a 4-1 win over Georgia Southern before taking down Tulane 4-3.
The Trojans’ weekend was highlighted by their Sunday victory over No. 48 Tulane, where they rallied from a doubles loss with two doubles wins and a 3-3 split in the singles phase. The Trojans have now won five of their last six matches and face a pair of road games before playing in the Sun Belt Championships starting April 20.
One day prior to its big win over the Green Wave, Troy travelled to Mobile to take on conference foe Georgia Southern.
The duo of Nancy Karaky and Sanae Ohta got Troy started with a win in doubles play, playing a 6-0 shutout over the Eagles’ Mariana Ranzahuer and Lindsay Truscott.
The next two doubles matches didn’t go as well for the Trojans as the tandem of Jiayuan Xue and Efriliya Herlina lost 6-2 before Hannah Seizer and Alicia Rodriguez lost their match 6-3.
Saturday’s singles matches were a completely different story, however, as the Trojans won four of their six matches. The other two went unfinished.
Xue, Herlina and Ohta all won in two sets while Seizer needed a third. Seizer dropped her first set 0-6, but turned things around with a 6-0 set to even things out before winning her match with a 7-5 score in the third set.
When the dust settled in singles play, Troy came away with the 4-1 win.
The next day, the Trojans kept up their level of play with an underdog win over a top-50 opponent.
Troy’s Rodriguez and Seizer dropped the first match of the day 6-2, but the duo of Karaky and Ohta evened the doubles score with a 6-4 win of their own. Xue and Herlina broke the tiebreaker with a 6-3 win over the Green Wave’s Kyla Klier and Christina Sist.
That tiebreaking doubles match ended up being the difference maker in the contest as the two sides traded blows in singles play.
Rodriguez got her team started with a 6-1, 6-2 win, followed by 6-1, 6-3 win from Xue in the third singles match of the day. Tulane took the next two singles matches, setting up a close match between Ohta and the Green Wave’s Kyla Klier.
After going up one set to none after a 6-4 start, Klier evened the playing field with a 6-7 response. Ohta took control in the third, however, and cruised to a 6-0 victory in the third set.
Troy will now look to carry its momentum into another big weekend. On Saturday, it will take on Middle Tennessee, followed by a Sunday matchup with conference rival South Alabama.
