Hoosiers defeat Badgers, Gophers

Coming off long road trips during the previous two weekends, the No. 34 IU women’s tennis team had a strong stand at home with victories against Minnesota and Wisconsin. IU defeated Minnesota 6-1 on Saturday and swept Wisconsin 7-0 on Sunday.

With the pair of wins over the weekend, the Hoosiers improved to 17-6 (6-3), and IU is in sole possession of fifth place in the Big Ten.

IU Coach Lin Loring said the Hoosiers’ decisive victories will help the team’s confidence because the women are playing very well.

“We’ve been playing well now for four or five weeks,” he said. “We’re pretty competitive at every position. I think it will just help us keep our momentum going.”

On Saturday, IU won the No. 1 and No. 3 doubles matches 8-3 to take an early lead against Minnesota.

In the No. 1 position, senior Leslie Hureau and sophomore Carolyn Chupa bested Natallia Pintusava and Raula Rincon Otero. Junior Sophie Garre and sophomore Katie Klyczek topped Tereza Brichacova and Jessika Mozia in the No. 3 spot.

Loring changed the team’s doubles combinations in the middle of March, and he said he will not make any more changes because the current doubles tandems are playing well.

“I think the girls are comfortable with them, and we’re playing pretty competitively at every position,” he said.

The Hoosiers played quickly and controlled the singles matches against the Golden Gophers.

IU won the No. 3, No. 6, No. 2 and No. 5 singles matches in consecutive sets to give IU the victory and a 5-0 lead.

Chupa defeated Otero 6-0, 6-4 in the No. 3 match.

Senior Jithmie Jayawickrema topped Yuliana Umanets 6-3, 6-1 in the No. 6 position.

No. 90 Klyczek bested Brichacova 7-5, 6-2 in the No. 2 match.

Garre defeated Aria Lambert 6-2, 6-4 in the No. 5 spot.

No. 122 Hureau came from behind to earn IU’s final point of the match when she bested Pintusava 4-6, 6-0, 6-3.

Minnesota’s only singles victory was in the No. 4 match after IU had already won the dual match. Mozia defeated sophomore Alecia Kauss 6-7 (7-9), 6-4, 1-0 (10-7).
IU notched its ninth 7-0 victory of the season against Wisconsin.

IU won the doubles point after winning the No. 1 and No. 3 matches by 8-3 margins. Hureau and Chupa defeated Hannah Berner/Lauren Chypyha in the No. 1 position. In the No. 3 match, Garre/Klyczek topped Helen Rabot/Lauren Burich.

The Hoosiers’ dominant play continued in the singles matches.

Every IU player won the first set of her match, and the Hoosiers lost only 10 games in their first sets.

Hureau won the No. 1 match against Wisconsin’s Berner 6-0, 6-1 after hitting a flurry of shots which were always a few steps outside of Berner’s reach.

In the No. 3 singles match, Chupa bested Anastasia Tripolskaya 6-2, 6-1.

Jayawickrema won the match point for IU when she topped Pernilla Wohlstrom 6-1, 6-0 in the No. 6 position.

In the No. 2 spot, Klyczek defeated Chypyha 6-4, 6-4 and Kauss took care of business in the No. 4 match by topping Burich 6-2, 6-3.

After winning the first set of the No. 5 match 6-1, Garre lost the second set 2-6 to Katie Hoch. With her teammates cheering for her from a nearby court, Garre won the tiebreaker 10-4 to win the match, which capped off IU’s 7-0 victory. Loring said the team’s biggest focus for the remainder of the season is trying to get healthy but also making practices just long enough that the women don’t lose their edge.

“At this point in the season, you’re not re-inventing the wheel,” he said. “You’re just trying to keep the wheel turning.”

IU will play Illinois on Friday at home before traveling to Northwestern on Sunday to wrap up the team’s regular season schedule.

Jayawickrema said the team’s goal is to win the final two dual matches.

“We do need to be consistent so that we have a good momentum going into the Big Ten Tournament,” she said.

The four-day Big Ten Tournament begins on April 25 at IU.