ANNAPOLIS, Md. – The Navy women's tennis team (7-0) tallied its seventh-straight win to open the 2022 spring dual season with a 6-1 victory over George Washington (1-3) Saturday at the Tose Family Tennis Center.
The Mids swept doubles competition for the third time in four matches, improving to a stellar 20-1 in doubles. Additionally, Navy won five of its six singles matches, three being in straight sets, to increase its dual-season record to 38-4 as a team.
The 7-0 start by the Midshipmen improves on what is already the second-best start to a season in program history, which only trails the 2012 Navy women's tennis team which started the season with 11-consecutive wins.
"Today was a good win over a good George Washington team," said head coach
Keith Puryear. "They are well coached and fight well. I thought we did a good job sticking around when things got tough in many sets.
Kacey Moore and
Jillian Taggart fought back from down 5-1 to win in a breaker at the No. 1 doubles.
Katreina Corpuz showed good mental tenacity to win a breaker in the second after being up and serving for it at 5-4. Stella (Ribaudo) and Casey (Accola) showed great resilience to recover nicely in their matches as well.
"Emily (Tannenbaum) played a good match from start to finish, it was the most complete match that she has played thus far this spring. I also saw very good takeaways in
Jillian Taggart's match at No. 1. We talked about a few things she'll use for maximum benefit moving forward. We must now get ready for a quick turnaround for tomorrow's match versus a good Delaware team."
Navy opened doubles play with a victory at the No. 2 position as
Katreina Corpuz (Sr., Ewa Beach, Hawai'i) and
Emily Tannenbaum (Fr., Commack, N.Y.) downed the George Washington pairing of Charlotte Bell and Lindsay Thompson (6-2).
Casey Accola (Jr., Winter Garden, Fla.) and
Corinne Farid (So., Columbia, Mo.) followed closely behind at the No. 3 spot, earning the doubles point for the Mids with a victory over the Colonials' Lara McNaughten and Alexandra Vesikallio (6-3).
With the doubles point already in hand, the No. 1 duo of
Kacey Moore (Sr., Wellington, Fla.) and
Jillian Taggart (Jr., Fair Oaks, Calif.) battled back from a 5-1 deficit to defeat Katarina Marinkovikj and Stella Wiesmann (7-6), securing the sweep of doubles play for Navy.
With the win, the pairing of Moore and Taggart improve to 6-2 on the season, along with a 3-1 mark when playing at the No. 1 position.
In singles, the Mids jumped out to an early 2-0 lead as Moore earned a victory at the No. 3 position (3-0, Retired) as Vesikallio was forced to retire from the match through three points in the first set. The Colonials reduced their deficit to 2-1 with a win by Wiesmann at the No. 1 spot over Taggart in straight sets (6-1, 6-3).
Tannenbaum brought the Navy advantage back to two points with a victory at the No. 2 spot over Katarina Marankovikj (6-0, 6-1) prior to Corpuz netting a straight-set win of her own in the No. 4 singles match against Lindsay Thompson (6-2, 7-6) to secure the seventh-consecutive victory for the Midshipmen.
With her decision at the No. 2 singles position, Tannenbaum became the first Navy women's tennis player this season to eclipse the 20-win mark in singles play.
With victory over the Colonials assured, Accola downed Alejandra Ramirez in the No. 6 singles competition (7-5, 6-2) followed by
Stella Ribaudo (So., Chicago, Ill.) earning a win at the No. 5 match (6-1, 1-6, 6-2) to finalize the 6-1 victory for Navy over George Washington.
In a counted singles match played outside of the scored competition,
Sylvia Eklund (Fr., Bellevue, Wash.) defeated McNaughten in a single set, 8-3.
UP NEXT
The Midshipmen will have a quick turnaround as they hit the road Sunday for a match against Delaware. Action from Newark is slated to get underway at 3 p.m.
