EAST LANSING, Mich. — Michigan State women’s tennis secured its first Big Ten win, sweeping the visiting Minnesota Golden Gophers 4-0 at the MSU Indoor Tennis Center on Saturday. With the win, MSU moves to 8-7 (1-3 B1G) overall while the Golden Gophers slide to 5-10 (0-4 B1G) on the season.
“It feels really, really good,” said head coach Kim Bruno. “We are going to savor this one and hopefully continue the feeling heading into tomorrow.”
The Spartans started strong by taking the doubles point for the third-consecutive match in a highly contested opening to the dual. Due to a limited number of players on the Gophers roster, only two doubles matches were played, meaning the first pairing to win would take the doubles point for their team. Down 5-3, the duo of Marley Lambert and Dagmar Zdrubecka held Minnesota’s Lucy Lu and Zeyneb Sarioglan at bay as the Spartan pairing of Liisa Vehvilainen and Ayshe Can picked up an emphatic 6-2 win at the No. 1 position to steal the doubles point.
“When those two are getting forward and hitting volleys, I think they are one of the best doubles teams in the country,” said Bruno. “They made adjustments and stuck with the plan and that allowed us to clinch that point.”
MSU started the singles portion with a 2-0 lead after Minnesota forfeited a point due to insufficient players. The Spartans would then utilize impressive performances at the No. 2 and No. 3 singles positions to earn the clinch.
With Minnesota jumping out to first set leads at three courts, Spartans Can and Lambert were able to put the Green and White in a position to win the dual by taking…
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