VALDOSTA, Ga. - The No. 27 Valdosta State women's tennis team dropped the doubles point, but battled both a long rain delay and the early deficit to upend Lee University Sunday at VSU Tennis Complex in the regular season finale for both teams.
The Blazers improved to 10-11 overall and 8-2 in Gulf South Conference play, finishing tied for second in the regular season league standings with Auburn Montgomery. By virtue of the Blazers' upset win over AUM earlier in the season, VSU will be the No. 2-seed in the upcoming Gulf South Conference Championship, beginning next Saturday in Montgomery, Ala. VSU will face Lee again in the quarterfinal round of the conference tournament as Lee finished tied for sixth with Montevallo in the standings at 4-6 and 9-6 overall. Montevallo defeated Lee in the head-to-head matchup earlier in the season to earn the No. 6-seed.
The Flames won two of the three doubles matches to take the early lead as Lee's No. 28 duo of Maria Duarte and Ashleigh Sims won at the top spot over No. 35 tandem of freshman
Denisa Hanakova and junior
Viktoriia Fedorova. VSU won at No. 2 as junior
Kayla Greco and freshman
Aneta Poborilova won 7-5 over Kanna Kobayakawa and Maria Aguilo, but Lee's Lizza Gnilozubova and Mirjana Ragastovac won 7-5 at No. 3 over sophomore
Evelyn Altmaier and freshman
Natalie Rainke for the early lead.
The lead was short lived for the Flames, however, as VSU quickly tied the match at 1-1 as Altmaier downed Hayden Smith at No. 6, 6-0, 6-1, but Simes, ranked No. 54 nationally, defeated Hanakova at the top spot, 6-3, 6-2. From there, Greco leveled the match at 2-2 with a 6-2, 6-2 win over Gnilozubova prior to the long rain delay. Out of the delay Pezo dispatched Duarte, 6-3, 6-1 at No. 5 and the Blazers clinched the match with a 6-2, 6-2 win by Poborilova at No. 3 over Kobayakawa. Rainke was leading Aguilo in the second set, 2-0, after winning the first set 7-5 win the match was clinched.
Check back with vstateblazers.com later this week for a preview of the GSC Championship.
