MOBILE, Ala. -- It took four and a half hours to determine the outcome of Tuesday's NAIA National Tournament second round match between the Embry-Riddle and Oklahoma Christian women's tennis teams. In the end it was the eighth-seeded squad from Oklahoma Christian that was able to hold off the ninth-seeded Eagles of Embry-Riddle 5-4 to advanced to the national quarterfinals on Wednesday.
The Eagles began the match with a win at the top doubles spot as
Natasa Zoricic and
Yi Ching Chen downed Olfa Dhaoui and Maja Vuzem 8-3. Oklahoma Christian answered with a win a No. 3 doubles as Maja Pavsic and Leila Keihani bested
Caroline Nilsson and Sara Abraúl 8-4.
Julija Stojkovska and
Josefine Strom went up 8-7 at No. 2 doubles, but OCU's Andreea Constantines and Vimbai Mawisire battled back to knot the score at 8-8 and force a tiebreaker. The ERAU duo jumped out to a quick 4-0 lead, but once again, the team from OCU was able to mount a comeback and won the match 9-8 with an 8-6 decision in the deciding set.
Chen had little trouble with Pavsic at the second position in the singles line-up, dispatching the OCU freshman in straight sets, 6-1, 6-0. Nilsson followed with a 6-0, 6-3 defeat of Vuzem at No. 3 and Strom's 6-1, 6-3 win over Keihani at No. 5 gave ERAU at 4-2 advantage.
OCU came back to even the team score at 4-4 after Mawisire downed Abraul 6-1, 6-4 at No. 6 and 10th-ranked Dhaoui held off seventh-ranked Zoricic 6-4, 6-2 at No. 1.
The deciding point came down to the match at No. 4 singles between Stojkovska and Constantines. Constantines took the first set 6-1, but Stojkovska rebounded to take the second 6-3 to force a third set. Stojkovska registered a pair of breaks to take a 4-2 lead, but Constantines fought back to win the set 6-4 and clinch the victory for Oklahoma Christian.
Embry-Riddle closed out the season as the 2010 Sun Conference tournament and co-regular season champions with a 16-10 overall record. Chen and Strom worked their way into the Eagle record books by eclipsing the previous single-season win record of 22. Chen finished with 27 wins on the year, while Strom recorded 25.
