DAYTONA BEACH, Fla. – The eighth-ranked Xavier (La.) women's tennis team won two doubles and five singles points to take a 7-2 win over seventh-ranked Embry-Riddle (6-8), Thursday at ERAU's Crotty Tennis Complex.
Doubles play saw the Gold Nuggets (11-7) take a 1-0 lead when Amanda Materre and Olivia West downed
Ana Gonzalez-Hoy and
Meena Bennett 8-2 at the third spot. At No. 1, ERAU's
Kristina Marova and
Hui-I Huang fell to Kourtney Howell and Brion Flowers for a 2-0 Xavier advantage.
The match at No. 2 doubles between ERAU's
Giovanna Tomiotto and
Paola Montero and Xavier's Simone Alyse-Ewell and Amber Brown saw the Eagle duo fall behind early, 5-2. Tomiotto and Montero were able to rebound, however, and erased the deficit on the way to an 8-6 win for the Eagles' first point of the afternoon.
Xavier extended its lead to 4-1 when Brown bested Gonzalez-Hoy at the No. 5 spot and Materre topped Montero 7-5, 6-1 at No. 3. Following Bennett's 6-3, 6-2 loss to Vashni Balleste on court six, which clinched the victory for Xavier, ERAU junior Marova notched her 11th win of the year, topping Flowers 6-1, 6-3 on court two.
At the fourth position, Ewell was down 4-3 early in the first set but fought back to take the match with a 6-4, 7-6 (4) win over Tomiotto. The final match off the court was at the top singles spot where Huang and Howell were engaged in a three-hour battle. In the end, it was Howell who managed to edge Huang for the win, earning a 7-6 (2) decision in the first set and another 7-6 (4) in the second to seal the Xavier victory.
The Eagles' next match will be at 3:30 p.m. on Friday when they host the University of Northwestern Ohio at the Crotty Tennis Complex.
