DAYTONA BEACH, Fla. – The Embry-Riddle women's tennis pulled out a thrilling victory over St. Mary's (Texas) on Wednesday. In a contest that lasted nearly three and a half hours, the Eagles rallied after dropping the doubles point to win four singles matches and hand the Rattlers (7-1) their first loss of the season with a 4-3 win. Winners of six matches in a row, the Eagles are now 9-5 on the year.
The Rattlers led after doubles with wins at the second and third positions. Ashley Penshorn and Bailey Godwin got the first win for STMU with a 6-3 win over
Jessica Wira Hadipoernomo and
Mafalda Soares on court two, but
Itxaso Blanco and Carla Cabrero del Hierro evened the score when they teamed up for a 6-4 win over Alice Thane and Elena Munoz on court one. Marina Vigil and Gabi Iannou clinched the doubles point by holding off
Sabrina Ehrenfort and
Julia Mautner, 6-4.
The first two singles points went to the Eagles as No. 39 Blanco toppled 12th-ranked Penshorn 6-3, 6-3 at the top flight and Ehrenfort bested Iannou 6-4, 6-1 on court four.
Mautner increased the lead to 3-1 with her 6-3, 6-4 win over Iannou at the fifth position, but 41st-ranked Vigil got a team point back when she won a hard-fought battle against Cabrero del Hierro (6-1, 7-6 (8-6)) at No. 2.
The match between Soares and Angela Vargas went to three sets, and in the end it was the Rattlers' sixth-flight player who was able to pull out the win, 6-4, 2-6, 6-4 to even the team score.
The deciding point came down to the match between Wira Hadipoernomo and Thane on court three. In the first set, Wira Hadipoernomo trailed early, but battled back to take the set 7-5. The ERAU freshman got out in front in the second frame, but Thane came back to tie things up at 6-6 and force a tiebreaker. The pair traded points until Wira Hadipoernomo went up 5-4. After that, she rattled off two more unanswered scores to clinch the victory for ERAU.
The Eagles return to action on at 3:30 p.m. on March 22, hosting Montevallo at the Crotty Tennis Complex.
