The Idaho Vandals Men and Women’s Tennis teams both played at home during the same weekend for the first time this season. The women had two matches, one on Saturday and one Sunday, while the men only had one match on Saturday. Both teams won all their matchups and UI went 3-0 to keep improving their records.
Women’s Tennis
The weekend began late Saturday morning as the Vandals had a matchup against the Seattle University Redhawks. Things started strong as UI won the first doubles match with Ida Johansson and Lena Beckx defeating Jade Quintana and Natalia Michta of Seattle U by a final of 6-4. Unfortunately, the Redhawks won the next two doubles matches 7-5 in each of them to take two out of the three and jump ahead 1-0 in the overall match.
As singles play began, the Vandals began to turn things around, and they were victorious in four of the six matchups. Annabel Davis, Hanna Koprowska, Naomi Schrader and Valentina Rodas were the four UI players that won their matches. Rodas kept her opponent to one game in each set, winning 6-1, 6-1 and Schrader held her opponent to just two in each set, taking it 6-2, 6-2. Two Vandals with the best performances along with the other victors, helped them win the overall match by a 4-3 decision.
After Saturday’s match, Head Coach Sanne Louwers huddled with her team and told them they should be very proud of themselves. She said what she witnessed in singles was, “by far the best singles match.” She also mentioned the struggles during doubles and talked about how her goal going forward is to find a little bit of separation.
That message was well received because the next day the Vandals took on the Lewis and Clark State College Warriors and completely shut them down, winning by a commanding margin of 7-0.
The UI Women’s Tennis team is back home in the P1FCU Kibbie Dome Feb. 22 for another pair of matchups. The weekend will begin on Saturday against the University of Wyoming and continue Sunday against the University of the Pacific. Both matchups are slated to begin at 10 a.m.
Men’s Tennis
The Vandals Men’s Tennis team hosted their first conference matchup of the season as they welcomed the Eastern Washington Eagles on Saturday. UI began the day by sweeping doubles play 6-2, 6-1, 7-6. Part of that crew that won doubles was freshman Eric Wang who also had a great day in singles, keeping his opponent to just one win in the whole match winning 6-1, 6-0.
Gabriel Moroder did not have as clean of a win as he had to play very hard in his matchup against EWU junior Arshjot Bhatti. Moroder won the first set 6-4 but Bhatti took the second, 7-6, which meant a third tiebreaker set needed to be played. As it was getting late in the P1FCU Kibbie Dome, it was decided the tiebreak would be played to just one point, which was captured by Moroder capping off a hard-earned win.
After a four-and-a-half-hour match, Head Coach Raleigh Grossbaum thanked the fans who stuck around, then gathered his team on one of the courts to share his thoughts. He told them what he saw out there from his team was “really quality tennis in a lot of places.”
Grossbaum told The Argonaut that he was happy with the team’s performance, calling it phenomenal and fantastic. He has also been impressed with the team’s progress within a little over the last week as Grossbaum said, “the improvement we’ve made in the last eight days has been massive.”
The men’s team is back on the road next weekend, beginning Saturday with a matchup against the BYU Cougars that will begin at 2 p.m. On Sunday, they will take on the Cal Poly Mustangs at 10 a.m. Both matchups will take place in San Luis Obispo, California.
You can reach Jackson Hamelund at arg-sports@uidaho.edu