Alabama
Western Kentucky University
Alabama Women’s Tennis Set to Host Western Kentucky and Lipscomb
1/19/2018 3:00:00 PM | Women's Tennis
The Crimson Tide will face the Lady Toppers at 10 a.m. CT and will battle the Lady Bisons at 4 p.m on Jan. 21.
TUSCALOOSA, Ala. – The Alabama women's tennis team will host another doubleheader on Sunday, January 21 at the Roberta Alison Baumgardner Tennis Facility. The Crimson Tide will take on Western Kentucky at 10 a.m. CT and will follow by playing Lipscomb at 4 p.m. CT.
LAST TIME ON THE COURT
The Crimson Tide (2-0) opened the season with a bang, sweeping Jackson State, 4-0, and, 7-0, in a doubleheader on Jan. 13 at the Roberta Alison Baumgardner Tennis Facility
In the morning session, junior Andie Daniell and sophomore Alba Cortina-Pou defeated Lucia Solis and Tyler Smith, 6-1, while senior Smith Hinton and sophomore Jacqueline Pelletier topped Oni Jones and Ariel Dickson, 6-1. In singles play, Alabama snatched the first three matches to secure the 4-0 sweep in straight sets.
For the second half of the doubleheader, Alabama mirrored its morning doubles performance, winning the doubles point by shutting out the Lady Tigers. In singles play, sophomore Ann Selim silenced Oni Jones in straight sets, 6-0, 6-0, to give the Tide a 2-0 lead after doubles. Sophomore Kimberley Gintrand then followed with a solid performance at the No. 6 position, defeating Ariel Dickson, 6-1, 6-1. For the win, senior Smith Hinton rolled past Tyler Smith, 6-1, 6-0, to give the Tide its second victory of the day.
The men's and women's tennis programs both opened the season playing Jackson State simultaneously for the first time in program history.
SERVING UP 2018
Alabama opened the spring season on Jan. 13 after a successful fall slate, where the Crimson Tide competed in three tournaments, including the 30th Annual Roberta Alison Fall Classic at the end of October.
Alabama returns three letterwinners and welcomes five newcomers, including four transfers, to 2018.
Junior Andie Daniell comes back to the Capstone as the Tide's top player, ranking at No. 106 in the latest ITA rankings.
Daniell opened the fall season ranked at No. 37 on the ITA preseason list and finished fall play, 9-2, defeating two ranked opponents (No. 85 Madison Westby, Southern California, and No. 56 Eden Richardson, LSU), while reaching the semifinal round of the 2017 ITA Southern Regional Championships.
Alabama tennis will use PlaySight, a live streaming technology, which provides the ability to live stream in high definition and record/store practice and match sessions to the indoor and outdoor tennis facilities.
MARKETING PROMOTIONS
"Give a shirt/Get a shirt": Fans can donate a shirt and get an Alabama shirt in return.
ABOUT THE OPPONENT – WESTERN KENTUCKY
Sunday's match will mark the second meeting in program history between the Lady Toppers and the Crimson Tide. In the first meeting, the Tide downed WKU, 6-3, on April 6, 1979.
The Lady Toppers return five letterwinners including 2017's top singles winner, Elpida Malamou, who registered a 14-2 mark in singles play (No. 1) and 6-4 record in doubles.
WKU finished its 2017 campaign in the semifinal round of the Conference USA Tournament. Head coach Jonatan Berhane won C-USA Coach of the Year while registering a 13-6 record to finish third in the conference.
ABOUT THE OPPONENT – LIPSCOMB
Sunday will mark the first meeting in program history between the Lady Bisons and the Crimson Tide.
Lipscomb returns ASUN Player of the Year, Viktoriya Dzyuba, back to 2018 who went undefeated in ASUN play last year, only dropping one set, while ranking as high as No. 58 on the ITA list.
2017 REVIEW
Last season, the Crimson Tide was ranked in the ITA polls for 11 straight weeks (Feb. 28-May 24) and held its highest ranking at No. 33 on April 11 after the team defeated in-state rival No. 12 Auburn, 4-3. In the final ITA rankings, the Tide landed at No. 43. The squad also topped two other top-40 teams including No. 40 Tulsa (Feb. 24) and No. 13 Kentucky (March 24).
Former Crimson Tide tandem of Maddie Pothoff and Erin Routliffe highlighted the 2017 campaign, finishing as the runner-up at the NCAA Doubles Championship, which marked the third time in the last four year a Tide pairing made the NCAA double championship The tandem ended the year as the second best team in the nation and registered four victories against ranked opponents in the 2017 NCAA Tournament. The most notable win the pair had on the year was in a 7-6 (4) decision against Kentucky's No. 4-ranked doubles team which helped the Tide edge the Wildcats for the 14th time in school history. Both Routliffe and Pothoff earned All-America honors and was named to the ITA Collegiate All-Star Team, while Pothoff also earned First Team All-SEC honors.
COMING UP
Alabama will compete in its first road test against UCF on Friday, Jan. 26 at 5 p.m. CT, and will later host another pair of matches on Sunday, Jan. 28 against Belmont and UAB. Sunday's matches start at 10 a.m. and 4 p.m.
Get all the latest information on the team by following @AlabamaWTN on Twitter and Facebook and AlabamaWTN on Instagram. General athletic news can also be found at UA_Athletics on Twitter and Instagram and AlabamaAthletics on Facebook.
Players Mentioned
