SACRAMENTO, Calif. (March 20, 2021) – Bouncing back from an incredibly close loss on Friday, the Northern Arizona Lumberjacks opened up Big Sky Conference play with an impressive win on the road in Sacramento.
Sweeping through singles play, NAU clinched the team victory against the Sacramento State Hornets (1-10, 0-1 Big Sky) with five straight-set wins before closing out the day with a tiebreaker victory on Court 2. The win puts the Lumberjacks (7-4, 1-0 Big Sky) in need of possibly just one more victory in order to clinch a spot in the Big Sky Conference tournament with just four teams competing in the south division.
"After losing a very tight doubles point, the girls came back with great energy and team spirit for singles," said NAU assistant coach
Christa Gecheva. "The girls played with unity and competed as one which helped them close out sets and wrap matches up. The energy and spirit had a domino effect across the courts. It was fun seeing all our hard work pay off and come together in the first conference match of the season."
Freshman
Ava Neyestani opened up singles with a 6-2, 6-1 victory against Jin Yu at No. 5, evening the score at 1-1 after dropping a closely contested doubles point.
Gina Dittmann then put the Lumberjacks ahead 2-1 with yet another victory at No. 1, beating Jayden Nielsen 6-4, 6-0 at No. 1.
The win extends Dittmann's personal streak to eight straight matches at No. 1 with a 9-1 overall record in her freshman season.
Similarly,
Mimi Bland pushed her win streak to seven straight matches, beating Tsveti Yotova 7-5, 6-1 at No. 3. To clinch the team victory,
Aleksandra Buczynska earned her first victory of the season in her first completed match for the Lumberjacks as she took Court 4 6-2, 7-5 against Grace Dodd.
From there,
Elinor Beazley added the fifth point of the day at No. 6 with a 6-0, 7-6 (7-3) win at No. 6 and
Ellie Millard outlasted Megan Tagaloa 6-3, 5-7, 10-3 in a third-set tiebreaker at No. 2. Millard's win completed the singles sweep as NAU bounced back from a 2-1 loss in the three doubles matches.
Dittmann and Beazley opened the day with a 6-3 win at No. 2 before Nielsen and Tagaloa earned a 6-4 victory at No. 1. Down to another tight match, Neyestani and
Madi Moore just missed clinching the point as they fell 7-5 to Dodd and Yotova on Court 3.
NAU returns home for one match next week, continuing Big Sky play as they host the Idaho State Bengals on Friday at 2 p.m. The Lumberjacks have just five matches remaining in the regular season, with the Big Sky Championships set for May 1 and 2 in Phoenix.
