TUCSON, Ariz. (February 4, 2023) - NAU Women's Tennis concluded its two-day stay at LaNelle Robson Tennis Center with a doubleheader against Fresno State and the University of Arizona. The Lumberjacks split the two matches, coming back to beat the Fresno State Bulldogs 4-3 and dropping the match against the host Wildcats 4-1.
NAU's victories on Courts 4 through 6 paved the way for a comeback win after Fresno State took the doubles point with wins on Courts 1 and 2. The duo of senior
Elinor Beazley and freshman
Daryna Shoshyna defeated Fresno State senior Pang Jittakoat and sophomore Matilde Magrini 6-4 on Court 3.
Fresno State jumped to a quick 2-0 lead at the start of singles play as freshman Meshkatolzahra Safi took down junior
Ava Neyestani, 6-3, 6-1 on Court 3.
The Bulldogs continued to roll on the higher courts when Jittakoat defeated junior
Sofia Markova, the reigning Big Sky Player of the Week, 6-3, 6-4.
The lower court began to shine in the Lumberjacks' favor. Sophomore
Laura Duhl anchored her team on Court 6 by turning a tough 7-6 win in her first set into a 6-0 sweep in the second set against senior Carlotta Nonnis Marzano to win NAU's first point.
Down 3-1, NAU needed to run the table on Courts 2, 4 and 5 to take the win. Junior
Ana Karen Guadiana Campos helped close the gap on Fresno State with a solid 6-3, 6-4 win over Magrini on Court 2. Freshman
Patrycja Niewiadomska did the same on Court 4 against junior Carolina Piferi with a 7-6, 6-4 win, thus leaving Court 5 as the deciding match.
The only match to go to three sets, the battle between Shoshyna and freshman Mariya Vyshkina was a showdown for the ages. A pair of freshmen from the same hometown of Kharkiv, Ukraine, the two battled to an extended first set that Vyshkina won 7-6 for Fresno State. Shoshyna came back from the tough set loss to sweep Vyshkina 6-0 in the second set.
In the final set that determined the outcome of the day, Shoshyna led early in the set and held on to victory over her Kharkiv compatriot, 6-4.
The win over Fresno State avenges a 4-3 the Lumberjacks suffered to the Bulldogs in Fresno, California back in March 2019.
NAU concluded the day with a match against Arizona looking to snap a 13-match losing streak to the Wildcats going back to 2010. While unable to claim the victory in a 4-1 loss, the Lumberjacks snagged at least one point against the Power 5 school for the sixth-straight time.
The Lumberjacks dropped the doubles point again but did not go down without a fight. After Neyestani and Guadiana dropped the match on Court 1 6-3, Beazley and Shoshyna in a battle on Court 3 against sophomores Belen Nevenhoven and Midori Castillo-Meza. The Lumberjack duo pushed the Wildcats to the brink but lost 7-5.
Arizona led each doubles match 4-3 at one point and Court 2's match was left unfinished.
The Wildcats jumped to a 3-0 lead with quick outings in singles. Graduate student Salma Ziouti defeated Guadiana on Court 2, improving from a contested 6-3 first set to a 6-0 sweep in Set 2.
Freshman Tanvi Narendran had a strong and consistent showing against Niewiadomska to win on Court 4 by a score of 6-1, 6-2 to get Arizona to within one win of securing its sixth victory of the season.
Before Arizona shut the door on the match, the Lumberjacks avoided the sweep with a win on Court 6. Shoshyna, who clinched the win against Fresno State earlier in the day, put her dominance on display against Nevenhoven by winning 6-4, 6-1.
