CHARLOTTESVILLE, Va. – The No. 5 Virginia women’s tennis team (19-3, 11-1 ACC) won 6-1 against No. 19 Miami (9-6, 7-4 ACC) on Friday (April 12) at the Virginia Tennis Facility at the Boar’s Head Resort.
The Cavaliers won the doubles point and took the first three singles matches to clinch at 4-0. After Miami picked up a point on court five, the Cavaliers added a pair of victories in 10-point third-set tiebreakers on the top two courts to close out the 6-1 victory.
Senior Sara Ziodato won the clinching point.
The match was played in gusty winds. During the doubles point, a brief rain shower blew through the area, halting play for half an hour.
Juniors Mélodie Collard and Elaine Chervinsky got the Cavaliers off to a hot start, winning 6-0 on the top court before the rain delay. Grad student Natasha Subhash and senior Hibah Shaikh held a 5-2 lead on court two when play was suspended. After the delay, they closed out a 6-2 victory to clinch the point.
Subhash logged her most dominant singles victory of the season, winning 6-0, 6-0 on court four to put UVA up 2-0. Collard followed with a 6-0, 6-2 win on six to give UVA a 3-0 lead. Ziodato downed Antonia Blazert 6-1, 6-2 on court three to clinch the victory.
Shaikh had won her first set 6-0 against Isabella Pfennig on court two, but dropped her second 6-4. Shaikh took the tiebreaker 10-6 to secure the victory.
On the top court, sophomore Annabelle Xu won her first set 6-2 against No. 9 Alexa Noel, but Noel stormed back with a 6-0 win in the second set. Xu took the tiebreaker 10-7 to close out the Cavaliers’ 6-1 victory.
MATCH NOTES
- This was Virginia’s sixth top-25 victory of the season
- Annabelle Xu’s win against No. 9 Alexa Noel was the highest-ranked victory of her career and her second win against a player ranked in the top 20
- Xu’s win was the fourth time this season a Cavalier defeated a top 10 player with Hibah Shaikh logging three top 10 victories
- The Cavaliers head into the final match of the regular season in a tie for first place in the ACC with North Carolina. Both teams have 11-1 records in conference play
- Virginia improves to 11-0 at home
ON THE HORIZON
- The Cavaliers close out the regular season on Sunday, April 14, taking on No. 23 Florida State at noon
- Sunday’s match is Senior Day, with Natasha Subhash Hibah Shaikh and Sara Ziodato all being recognized at 11:45 a.m. in an on-court ceremony
- Brackets for the ACC Championship will be released on Sunday, April 14