The No. 2 North Carolina women’s tennis team advanced to the quarterfinals of the NCAA Tournament Friday in Urbana, Ill., after a 4-1 win against No. 15 Nebraska.
Though UNC (28-3) has been plagued with problems in doubles in the last few matches, the team righted the ship and took the doubles point behind senior Lauren McHale/freshman Ashley Dai and senior Gina Suarez-Malaguti/junior Tessa Lyons. Dai returned to the court after sitting out last week’s matches against South Carolina State and Tennessee due to injury.
Nebraska (24-6) boasted the third best doubles pair in the country with Mary Weatherholt and Patricia Veresova, but they were losing to UNC’s No. 58 Caroline Price and Whitney Kay 7-6 when doubles finished.
During singles play, Kay was first off the court after losing to Nebraska’s Stefanie Weinstein 6-4, 6-1. But after the match was knotted up at 1-1, UNC wouldn’t lose another point in the rest of the match, getting wins from McHale, Price and freshman Kate Vialle. When the match stopped with the 4-1 victory, Suarez-Malaguti and senior Zoe De Bruycker were both in the third sets of their matches.
This will be the third time in the last four years that UNC has advanced to the quarterfinals. The rest of the tournament will test the endurance of teams with the quarterfinals, semifinals and finals occurring on consecutive days.
The Tar Heels will now face No. 7 UCLA on Sunday at 5 PM EST. Earlier in the year, UNC defeated the Bruins 4-3 in the finals of the ITA National Indoor Championship. If UNC gets past UCLA, the Tar Heels could get revenge on No. 6 Miami and then No. 1 Florida, who have contributed to two of the three losses for UNC this year.
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