June 9, 2010

2010 Northwestern Dual Statistics

Final Campbell's/ITA College Tennis Rankings

EVANSTON, Ill. -- At the end of a campaign that covers more than eight months of competition, it's easy to let the final count of wins and losses define a season. But the 2009-10 Northwestern women's tennis team was characterized by so many hard-fought victories both big and small, it's important to take a closer look to relive what was another landmark season for the Wildcats.

For starters, Northwestern spent time ranked No. 1 in the nation for the third year in a row and finished the season with a No. 7 national ranking, its seventh consecutive campaign ranked among the top 10 at season's end.

More importantly, Northwestern grew into a team with the ability to seize the biggest moments and raise their level of play, a tendency that was never more apparent than on the big stage of the ITA National Indoor Team Championship. NU defended its historic 2009 title by coming out on top once again at Wisconsin's A.C. Nielsen Tennis Center, defeating teams that eventually finished the season ranked Nos. 13, 12, 3 and 2 in the country along the way.

"Wow, I still have to pinch myself to be sure I wasn't dreaming," Northwestern 12th-year head coach Claire Pollard said of the Indoor national title. "To see the girls handle the pressure of being down-and-out a couple of times and still finding a way to win was very rewarding. It was the ultimate team effort."

According to Pollard, seeing sophomore Elena Chernyakova hit a drop volley to clinch a 4-3 win over Florida -- coming back from down 5-4 in the decisive third set -- and the subsequent celebrations by her team ranks as one of the defining moments for the 2009-10 season.

"The looks on the girls' faces just told the whole story. I had a good feeling then that we weren't going to lose that weekend," Pollard said.

But again, that stellar weekend was the source of only a relative handful of memorable moments in another scintillating season for the 23-7 Wildcats. Delving a bit deeper:

• A pair of NU seniors, Lauren Lui and Samantha Murray, continued to perform at the same high level they had their entire careers, each earning All-Big Ten honors and earning bids to the NCAA Doubles and Singles Championships, respectively. Murray, who became the third NU player in history to qualify for the singles championship each of her four years in Evanston, won her opening-round her match for the first time when she upset No. 18 Marina Cossou of Cal.

• Lui concluded her career with a four-year Big Ten singles record of 37-2 while Murray, who ranked No. 36 in the nation at the end of her senior year, racked up a mark of 33-4.

• Junior Maria Mosolova became a singles All-American for the third time in her career, reaching the round of 16 in the NCAA Championships. Mosolova, also an All-Big Ten honoree, tied Lui for the team lead in dual victories (20) and in October won her first Midwest Regional Singles title. She improved to 25-1 in career Big Ten dual singles matches and eventually finished the season ranked No. 12 nationally.

• Northwestern continued its dominance at the Big Ten Tournament under Pollard's direction, winning the event for the 12th consecutive season. NU met and defeated Michigan in the championship match for the sixth year in a row, this time adapting to the role of underdog after Michigan had earned the No. 1 seed by completing the Big Ten regular season a perfect 10-0.

• Four Wildcat underclassmen -- sophomores Elena Chernyakova and Stacey Lee and freshmen Linda Abu Mushrefova and Kate Turvy -- repeatedly stepped up when it mattered most. Turvy was the only NU player to complete and win all three of her singles matches at the Big Ten Tournament and joined with Murray to post a 16-1 record at No. 3 doubles. Abu Mushrefova, meanwhile, stepped into the singles lineup in April and went 7-3, winning both of her matches in the NCAA Regional rounds. Like Turvy, Abu Mushrefova also settled into a key role in doubles, playing on the No. 1 line alongside the veteran Lui.

Fall 2009
Coming off two of the most storybook seasons in NU tennis history, Northwestern began its search for a new identity in the fall after the departure of three key seniors. The individual season kicked off once again at the Furman Invitational where Mosolova and Murray coasted to singles titles in flights one and five, respectively, while Murray also partnered with Abu Mushrefova to win the flight three doubles championship.

The following week, four Wildcats jetted west to the ITA All-American Championships, including freshman Brittany Wowchuk, who started strong by losing just one total game in winning her first two matches in the prequalifying draw.

Following a rain-abbreviated Wildcat Invitational, NU remained in Evanston to host the ITA Midwest Regional Championships, where Mosolova took advantage of her familiar surroundings to win the title, defeating Notre Dame's second-seeded Kristy Frilling in the final 6-1, 6-2. In doing so, Mosolova became the seventh Wildcat since 2001 to win the regional crown. NU also asserted itself in doubles play against its regional opponents, sending three doubles duos into the quarterfinals with two advancing as far as the semifinals.

Northwestern's final team event was the annual Duals in the Desert in Palm Springs, Calif., against the likes of top programs including Texas, UCLA, USC and Georgia. Murray finished 4-0 on the weekend while Lee won her of her four singles matches.

Spring 2010
Northwestern began the 2010 dual season with a No. 2 national ranking after receiving nine first-place votes in the Campbell's/ITA College Tennis poll. The Wildcats won early-season matches against William & Mary, Old Dominion, Princeton and Florida State -- sweeping three of those four -- to enter the ITA National Indoor Team Championship as the No. 2 seed. After dispatching of Tennessee in the first round, NU faced a tough test in the quarterfinals from No. 7 Florida, but Chernyakova's late-match heroics were enough to send the Wildcats into a semifinal contest with Cal -- the same team that had eliminated NU from the NCAA Championships each of the previous two season. But the Wildcats exorcised those demons by beating the Golden Bears 4-3, with Murray posting a huge two-set win over then-No. 10 Cossou at No. 2 singles.

That set up a championship showdown with North Carolina, who entered the tournament as the No. 11-ranked team but would eventually finish the season as No. 3. Northwestern, still the only northern school to claim the Indoor championship, used its formula of the doubles point plus wins from its three upperclassmen to seal back-to-back titles.

It may have been asking a bit much for the Wildcats to then immediately head on the road to face another top-five team, but that's what they were forced to do when they traveled to Notre Dame on Feb. 15. The Fighting Irish prevailed on their home courts, 5-2, but it was only a minor setback for the `Cats, who won their next five matches in a stretch that included tough wins over Georgia Tech and much-improved Illinois and Purdue squads.

NU's 4-0 start in the Big Ten set up a showdown with then No. 8 Michigan in what in previous seasons was a rare matchup between two Big Ten teams ranked in the top 10. The two squads split the six singles decisions, leaving Michigan's sweep of doubles play as the deciding point in a tight 4-3 match. It was Northwestern's first loss to a Big Ten opponent in almost six calendar years, but the Wildcats would channel that loss into motivation for the rest of the year.

Northwestern suffered one more 4-3 loss on April 9, this time at No. 1 Baylor, despite an impressive win by Murray at No. 2 over 16th-ranked Nina Secerbegovic.

After successfully closing out the Big Ten regular season, NU headed to Iowa for the conference tournament and easily landed in the title match against the top-seeded conference champion Wolverines. The Wildcats had no problem avenging its doubles sweep of earlier in the year, winning at Nos. 2 and 3 while leading at No. 1 when the match was abandoned. Mosolova, Turvy and Abu Mushrefova then took care of their singles matches to clinch a 12th-straight tournament title for Pollard.

"We were just hungry and we talked about doing all the things you learn all year being a Wildcat," Pollard said after the match. "Every year you sigh this sigh of relief. Michigan has gotten better and better and really motivated us this year, and the league is getting better in general. I'm grateful every time we win."

NCAA Championships
Northwestern earned the No. 6 seed in the NCAA Championships and, for the second year in a row, began its postseason journey against Miami (Ohio). The results were no different than in 2009 as the `Cats again swept the RedHawks, earning NU a second-round matchup with No. 37 Nebraska. Though the match was closer than the score indicates, the Wildcats advanced with a 4-0 victory to earn its seventh-consecutive trip to the NCAA Round of 16 at the Dan Magill Tennis Center in Athens, Ga.

Waiting for the Wildcats were the 11th-seeded Hurricanes of Miami (Fla.), a talented team that endured an up-and-down season but that featured three ranked singles players as well as the nation's sixth-ranked doubles tandem. Miami won a critical match at No. 2 doubles, edging Mosolova and Chernyakova 9-7 to take the doubles point, and took victories at the top three singles positions to post a 4-1 victory and advance to the quarterfinals.

Shifting gears for the individual championships, Mosolova won hard-fought matches against Harvard's Holly Cao and North Carolina's Katrina Tsang before coming up against the tournament's second seed and eventual finalist, Jana Juricova of Cal. Mosolova battled to the very end, fighting off a total of six match points before eventually succumbing 6-3, 7-6 (8), finishing her junior campaign with a mark of 31-14. Similarly, after her first-round upset of Cossou, Murray lost in two sets to the No. 1 overall seed, Irina Falconi of Georgia Tech, ending her senior season with a record of 28-12.

Lui and first-time individual qualifier Chernyakova lost their first-round doubles match to the 46th-ranked team from TCU, Kayla Duncan and Katariina Tuohima, in two sets.

"I've been reminding myself and the girls that we won National Indoors, we won the Big Ten Tournament and finished top-10 in the nation again," Pollard said. "We may not have been No. 2 but we are a heck of a program and there is so much more to come."

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