FLAGSTAFF, Ariz. (April 21, 2019) – The Northern Arizona women's tennis team will once again enter the Big Sky tournament as the number one seed after clinching their fourth straight regular season championship courtesy of a dominating 6-1 victory over Eastern Washington. With the win, the Lumberjacks (13-8, 9-1 Big Sky) earned one of the two first round byes and will take a nine-match winning streak into their semifinal match this upcoming Friday.
"I'm super proud of every single player on the team," said head coach
Ewa Bogusz. "We knew what Eastern Washington was bringing to the court. We were ready to go and the ladies absolutely dominated today. They knew what it was going to take and they played for each other. It showed big time today."
The 'Jacks will play the lowest remaining seed on Friday at 11 a.m. in one of the two semifinal matches. The 2019 Big Sky Championship will be held at the Phoenix Tennis Center for the third straight year. While NAU is the top seed, the remaining five seeds are up in the air and will be decided with tiebreakers. Eastern Washington, Idaho, Weber State, Southern Utah and Sacramento State are the five other qualifiers.
Sunday's regular season finale in Flagstaff was not only NAU's Senior Day for
Hanneke Lodewijks and
Eirene Granville, but a de facto championship match with the Lumberjacks and Eagles entering with tied for first-place with 8-1 conference records.
It did not take long for the 'Jacks to flex their muscle as Lodewijks and Millard registered their eighth consecutive doubles win, blanking Zoey Nelson and Louise Waite, 6-0, on court two. After the Eagles won on court one, sophomore
Madi Moore and freshman
Emilie Haakansson secured the doubles point for the Lumberjacks with a 6-3 victory at No. 3 versus Faye Worrall and Yasmin Mansouri.
Although the Lumberjacks won five of the six first sets in singles play, Eastern Washington battled NAU tough. The second set proved to be a different story and once the dominoes started to fall, the 'Jacks closed quickly.
Junior
Chiara Tomasetti broke through first at No. 1, pushing past Madeline Lamoreaux, 6-2, 6-3, to earn her single season school record tying 19th singles win. Tomasetti's victory opened the floodgates as the victories followed in rapid succession.
Freshman
Adrianna Sosnowska knocked off Waite, 6-3, 6-4, at No. 4 and Lodewijks clinched the match – and the regular season championship – at No. 2 with her 6-2, 6-3 victory over Nelson.
With NAU leading 4-0 on the scoreboard, Haakansson and Moore fought through close first sets to win their respective matches at No. 5 and 6 with ease. Haakansson defeated Worrall, 6-4, 6-0, and Moore collected a 7-5, 6-1 victory over Mansouri.
Eastern Washington got on the board on court three with the morning's only three-set victory.
After a 4-8 start to the season, NAU finished the regular season with nine straight wins, including seven by 5-2 scores or better. The Lumberjacks claimed the Big Sky regular season crown outright with victories over Idaho and Eastern Washington this weekend, snapping what was a three-way tie atop the standings.
"I'm super proud of what we've been able to do the last few weeks," Tomasetti said. "The performance from everyone, especially today, was good. We had a rough beginning to the season, but that made us stronger and now we're here winning the regular season."
Information regarding the 2019 Big Sky Championship bracket and NAU's semifinal opponent will be made available throughout the week on nauathletics.com and
@NAUWomensTennis on Twitter.
Results:
Doubles:
