Breann Lujan-Halcon
blujanha@uwyo.edu
Cowgirls tennis competed in the five-day ITA Mountain Regional Championships concluding Saturday in Las Vegas, Nev.
Wyoming competed alongside over 120 competitors from Air Force, Boise State, BYU, Colorado, Colorado State, Denver, Idaho, Idaho State, Montana, Montana State, UNLV, New Mexico, New Mexico State, Northern Colorado, Utah, Utah State and Weber State.
“We had a very up and down week,” Cowgirls head coach Dean Clower told gowyo.com following the weekend’s matches. “We can’t pick and choose what days we show up to play. If we are going to be successful as a team we have to be consistent with our progress.”
Beginning on Wednesday the tournament kicked off with the first round of singles and the first round of doubles in the Fertitta Tennis Complex.
The Cowgirls took four singles matches and one doubles match to advance into the next round.
“We have come a long way but still have miles to get where we want to be. We have glimpses of playing good doubles but somehow revert to old ways at times,” coach Clower told gowyo.com. “We are playing better which is all we can ask for.”
Junior Dorottya Jonas and freshman Elisa Koonik were the only doubles team from Wyoming out of three to come away with a victory. Joans and Koonik defeated a New Mexico State duo 8-7.
In singles sophomore Magdalena Stencel had a bye, automatically moving forward to the next singles round. Taking the singles victories for the Cowgirls was junior Miranda Talbert (7-6, 7-5), senior Nastya Tokareva (6-2, 6-2) and Jonas (6-3, 6-2).
“We played some good singles today,” coach Clower told gowyo.com. “Elisa [Koonik] showed signs of playing some high level tennis and Miranda [Talbert] did what we brought her in to do. Once again, we moved another step forward as a team and must continue to progress.”
Thursday the second round kicked off and the Cowgirls lost their sole doubles duo from maintrack competition and came away with one singles win.
“Today was a gut check day for the team as to who we are and what we want to be,” coach Clower said. “Hopefully, the ladies learned from the experience and we will continued to grow as a team.”
The only win for the day came from Stencel in three sets. Stencel overtook Nevada opponent 4-6, 7-5, 7-5 in the second singles round of the tournament.
Moving into the third round, Stencel took a loss to New Mexico competitor 6-2, 7-6, knocking her out of the championship run.
Friday the Cowgirls fell back into consolation rounds. Tokareva (6-1, 7-5) and Stencel (6-0, 7-5) took the only singles wins for the Cowgirls for the day.
Saturday the tournament wrapped up with three wins for Wyoming from Tokareva (6-1, 7-6, 10-6) Stencel (6-2, 6-2) and Koonik (6-4, 6-3)
Cowgirl tennis will wrap up their fall season at the Red and Blue Challenge in Dallas, Texas on Nov. 6.
