LAS VEGAS, Nev. (October 14, 2021) – Moving into the quarterfinals thanks to a pair of singles victories on Thursday, Northern Arizona sophomore
Gina Dittmann continued to back up her ranking as the top player in the Mountain Region.
Dittmann handed Denver senior Toni Nelson, an All-Summit League player in 2021, a 6-2, 6-3 loss in the Round of 32 to get her second day at the ITA Mountain Regionals started and move on to play another seeded player. Ranked No. 85 in the nation, Dittmann added another straight-set victory to her run in Las Vegas as she defeated the tournament's No. 10 seed, Radka Buzkova from Colorado State.
Buzkova entered the Mountain Regionals with a 7-1 record this fall after earning All-Conference USA Second Team honors last season as a member of the FIU Panthers. Dittmann's 6-1, 6-4 win moved her into the quarterfinals where she will face Taylor Melville from Denver.
Melville earned All-Summit League honors in 2021 while adding four player of the week awards from the conference, and entered the tournament as the No. 6 seed. Last season, Melville finished as the No. 5 player in the region. The winner of the quarterfinal match will face either No. 4 seed Molly Helgesson from UNLV or No. 14 seed Maria Oreshkina of Wyoming in the semifinals.
NAU's sensational sophomore wasn't the only ranked entry to move on during play on Thursday. Senior
Ellie Millard and junior
Mimi Bland moved into the Round of 16 at UNLV with an 8-6 victory against Emilee Astle and Kara Lin of BYU.
The duo, seeded No. 7 in the doubles draw, moves on to the Round of 16 with a match against Buzkova and her Colorado State teammate Matea Mihaljevic.
Elinor Beazley and
Laura Duhl fell in their respective Round of 32 singles matches on Thursday, and fell just short in a battle against Megan Forster and Mila Stanojevic of Colorado in the doubles draw.
Falling 8-7, Beazley and Duhl's match came down to a tiebreaker with Northern Arizona pairing dropping the decider 7-3. The two will play an additional match on Friday against a pairing from Utah.
In Flight One of singles, Duhl fell to the No. 8 seed, Izumi Asano of UNLV, 6-2, 6-1 and Beazley dropped her Flight Two match to BYU's Helen Jiao 6-1, 2-6, 6-2.
The ITA Mountain Regionals continue on Friday in Las Vegas with the doubles set for two rounds of play in the main draw and singles to begin its quarterfinal round. Additional singles and doubles matches will also be held, including
Sofia Markova and
Ava Neyestani taking on a doubles pairing from Boise State.
Updates throughout the fall and spring seasons can also be found on all of the NAU women's tennis team social media accounts,
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Facebook.
