No. 7 Texas and No. 20 Oklahoma welcomed the Mountaineers down south this weekend, leaving them still without a Big 12 victory.
WVU Tennis, now 11-5 this season, began its Big 12 campaign last weekend against Baylor and TCU but were swept away by both teams at home. Aside from both matches being cut short at 4-0, this weekend was the same story.
West Virginia opened its weekend in Austin against the No. 7 Texas Longhorns, ranked the second best team in the Big 12 behind No. 1 Oklahoma State. Aside from nearly grabbing the doubles point, West Virginia never measured up.
Senior Momoko Nagato and junior Michaela Kucharova led that doubles charge, winning 6-1 over Malaika Rapolu and Tanya Sasnouskaya. Paired separately, Rapolu and Sasnouskaya each appear in the ITA’s top 80 collegiate doubles rankings. Sasnouskaya is featured twice with different partners.
Graduate student Love-Star Alexis and sophomore Maja Dodik nearly capitalized on the doubles upset but fell 6-4 on court two, securing the doubles point for Texas.
From there, the Longhorns dominated singles. While neither team had its top singles star, with WVU missing junior professional Camilla Bossi and Texas without No. 20 Sabina Zeynalova, the Longhorns still had plenty of fire power.
Malaika Rapolu, ranked 21st by the ITA in women’s collegiate singles, took the court one spot and swept Love-Star Alexis 6-0, 6-0. Momoko Nagato nearly won again over Tanya Sasnouskaya, who ranks 39th in singles, after her doubles upset. Nagato fell 6-2, 6-4 on court two.
Just one singles match entered a third set, as junior Tatiana Lipatova stretched her first singles loss of the season to 6-4, 4-6, 1-0 (6) on court six.
Sunday against Oklahoma told a different story with a similar conclusion. West Virginia did not challenge the Sooners in doubles the same way they had against Texas, as each match played through to the end but all went in Oklahoma’s favor.
Nagato and Kucharova fought another ranked doubles pairing in No. 22 Roisin Gilheany and Dana Guzman but fell 6-2. Alexis and Dodik fell 6-3 to No. 63 Julia Garcia Ruiz and Zdena Safarova.
Guzman features in Oklahoma’s top-ranked doubles pairing, at No. 3 alongside Alina Shcherbinina. Individually, Guzman also ranks No. 42 in singles, putting her on court two behind Garcia Ruiz, who ranks No. 33 in singles. The remaining ranked Sooners, No. 72 Shcherbinina and No. 43 Florencia Urrutia, were absent against WVU.
Alexis matched up once again with the top-ranked opponent and fell 6-3, 6-1 to Garcia Ruiz. On court two, though, Nagato was relieved of her duties thanks to the arrival of freshman Maya Bordereau, who rested one of two weekend matches for the third straight week. Bordereau fell 6-3, 6-1 to Guzman.
Tatiana Lipatova once again provided WVU’s best singles performance, but this time, it led to a point. Lipatova defeated freshman doubles star Zdena Safarova 6-4, 6-4 on court six to give the Mountaineers their first team point of the season against a Big 12 opponent.
The Mountaineers return home this weekend to face the 5-6 Cincinnati Bearcats. It will be WVU’s first and final one-match weekend of the spring.
The Bearcats swapped opponents with WVU between Friday and Sunday, falling 7-0 to both Texas and Oklahoma. They did the same last weekend, welcoming TCU and Baylor on the opposite days of the Mountaineers. WVU will look to increase the Bearcats’ six-match losing streak at 1 p.m. on Friday in Morgantown.
Final Scores vs. Texas
Doubles Results
- Momoko Nagato/Michaela Kucharova (WVU) def. Malaika Rapolu/Tanya Sasnouskaya (UT), 6-1
- Charlotte Chavatipon/Vivian Ovrootsky (UT) def. Love-Star Alexis/Maja Dodik (WVU), 6-4
- Shachf Lieberman/Taisiya Pachkaleva (UT) def. Ting-Pei Chang/Tatiana Lipatova (WVU), 6-2
Singles Results
- No. 21 Malaika Rapolu (UT) def. Love-Star Alexis (WVU), 6-0, 6-0
- No. 39 Tanya Sasnouskaya (UT) Momoko Nagato (WVU), 6-2,6-4
- Charlotte Chavatipon (UT) def. Maja Dodik (WVU), 6-0, 6-4
- Taisiya Pachkaleva (UT) def. Ting-Pei Chang (WVU), 6-0, 6-3
- Vivian Ovrootsky (UT) def. Michaela Kucharova (WVU), 6-2, 6-1
- Shachf Lieberman (UT) Tatiana Lipatova (WVU), 6-4, 4-6, 1-0 (6)
Final Scores vs. Oklahoma
Doubles Results
- No. 22 Roisin Gilheaney/Dana Guzman (OU) def. Michaela Kucharova/Momoko Nagato (WVU), 6-2Â
- No. 63 Julia Garcia Ruiz/Zdena Safarova (OU) def. Love-Star Alexis/Maja Dodik (WVU), 6-3
- Ava Catanzarite/Chloe Noel (OU) def. Ting-Pei Chang/Tatiana Lipatova (WVU), 6-2
Singles Results
- No. 33 Julia Garcia Ruiz (OU) def. Love-Star Alexis (WVU), 6-3, 6-1
- No. 42 Dana Guzman (OU) def. Maya Bordereau (WVU), 6-3, 6-1
- Chloe Noel (OU) def. Momoko Nagato (WVU), 7-6 (4), 6-1
- Ava Catanzarite (OU) def. Maja Dodik (WVU), 7-5, 6-2
- Emma Staker (OU) def. Ting-Pei Chang (WVU), 6-4, 6-3
- Tatiana Lipatova (WVU) def. Zdena Safarova (OU), 6-4, 6-4
Photo from WVU Women’s Tennis
