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UH tennis dominates weekend matches against Wichita State, Louisiana

UH tennis senior Mimi Kendall-Woseley prepares to serve during this weekend's action. | Courtesy of UH athletics

UH tennis senior Mimi Kendall-Woseley prepares to serve during this weekend’s action. | Courtesy of UH athletics

It was a dominant weekend for the Houston tennis team as it defeated both Louisiana and Wichita State back-to-back on Saturday and Sunday, improving to 7-2 on the season, defeating the Ragin’ Cajuns 4-0 and the Shockers 4-1.

The Cougars dropped only one doubles match on the weekend and dominated through the singles, here’s how the matches went for the Cougars:

Louisiana

Doubles

Doubles kicked off the afternoon at the Barbara Wallace Winston Tennis Facility, UH took two out of the three matches total to get the point for the day and saw big wins from both pairs of winning Cougars.

Senior Phonexay Chitdara and freshman Gabriela Giraldo went against the senior and freshman pair of Christina Jordan and Isabella Kierkegaard, 6-3, in a back in forth battle that ultimately ended with UH on top, closing out the final sets for the win.

UH tennis sophomore Azul Pedemonti and Blanca Cortijo Parreno also got the win against Louisiana’s pair of sophomore Blanca Cortijo Parreno and freshmen Babette Burgersdijk, winning 6-2.

Singles

Three singles went unfinished due to the 4-0 win, but there was no shortage of excitement as the Cougars won five of their first six sets in, and ended the day early after winning the first three matches.

UH’s Cortijo, Pedemonti,and freshman Laura Slisane were the first to finish in the singles, which clinched the Cougars 4-0 win.

Cortijo defeated Burgersdjik (6-3, 6-2), Pedemonti defeated Kierkegaard (6-3, 6-3) and Slisane defeated Senior Christina Jordan (6-2, 6-4) despite only being a freshman.

The remaining matches went unfinished and were stopped with both Giraldo and Chitdara on pace to win their matchups as well, having already won the first set and with big leads in the second set.

Wichita State

Doubles

Sunday’s matches against Wichita State kicked off with the doubles matches, which finished with a thriller to decide who got the first point of the day.

The lone win from the doubles for the Cougars came from the pair of Pedemonti and Cortijo Parreno, who defeated the Shockers pair of redshirt freshman Natsumi Kurahashi and redshirt junior Alexandra Lazarova 6-3 in the contest.

UH’s pair of Chitdara and Giraldo were unable to defeat the Wichita State pair of redshirt senior Ting-Ya Hsu and freshman Jessie Zheng.

The doubles finished with probably the most intense matchup of the weekend, with UH senior Mimi Kendall-Woseley and Slisane just barely losing to Wichita State’s pair of redshirt seniors Marta Bellucco and Sarvinoz Saidhujaeva, 7-6 (7-4) in a back-and-forth nail biter.

Singles

The Cougars swept through the singles on the day, winning four total and leaving two unfinished, and giving the Cougars the 4-1 win overall to complete the weekend.

Parreno got the Cougars on the board first with her dominating performance against Lazarova, winning (6-2, 6-1) in a dominating performance. Giraldo would quickly follow this with her (6-0, 6-3) win over Zheng.

Pedemonti defeated Ting-Ya Hsu (6-1, 7-6, 7-4) in a tight contest, which set UH one singles win away from wrapping up the weekend, which would ultimately come from Slisane, who struggled early but finished strong to win (3-6, 6-1, 6-0) with a dominant final two sets.

UH had a few stoppages due to injury which came from the two unfinished matches, Kendall-Woseley had to have an ankle wrapped and Chitdara also had to have a medical attendant come out, but both were able to continue.

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