As the Owls entered day two of their tournament, they were hoping to build on success they had experienced the previous day. Junior Alicia Doms came out on top in her only singles match of the day, defeating Drexel’s Marcela Rosales 6-3, 6-2. She will now advance to the semifinals of the 1st round consolation bracket.
“She played very well,” head coach Steve Mauro said. “There will be one singles match with her tomorrow, so I’m looking forward to see how she does.”
Sophomore Ama Osei was the only other player who won today at the Cissie Leary Invitational at the University of Pennsylvania. She was victorious in her first match today, defeating Delaware’s Nataliya Naumova 6-1, 7-5.
She lost her second match 6-4, 6-3 to Akiko Okuda of Dartmouth, but Mauro was satisfied with how she played.
“She played well in her second match,” he said. “I’m happy about her performance so far this fall.”
Sophomore Rebecca Breland sustained her first singles loss of the tournament, losing 6-1, 6-3 to Sarah Bessen of Dartmouth. Mauro said that he expects better performances from Breland in the future.
“It wasn’t a good performance for Rebecca today,” he said. “She’ll be more solid as the season progresses.”
Breland took a more positive approach.
“I think I did well,” she said. “It could have been better, but in time, I’ll do better.”
Sophomore Yana Mavrina lost in straight sets 6-2, 6-1 to Penn’s Sol Eskenazi. Eskenazi is the top-seeded player in the draw.
“She played well,” Mauro said. “It’s still early in the season, so her game will only get better.”
Junior Jordan Batey took her match to the third set tiebreaker before also falling to Okuda 7-5, 2-6, 14-12.
“She could have won her match,” Mauro said.
Batey commented that her opponents were playing very well.
“There’s a lot of good competition,” Batey said. “I think I’ve been playing pretty solid, getting into the rhythm of match play.
Junior Carly Bowman was defeated by Richmond’s Katya Salas 6-0, 6-0.
“She had a tough match today,” he said. “Today just wasn’t her day.”
Doms and Batey put up a good fight in their double match, but eventually they lost 8-7 (4) to Akron’s Ksenia Beresteska and Signe Lazdina. This was a back-and-forth match that went to a tiebreaker.
“That match could have gone either way,” Mauro said. “We just need to work a little more on putting balls away up at the net.”
Mauro also credited Akron, saying that they are a very strong team.
Bohman and Mavrina lost their doubles match 8-4 to Melissa Kandinata and Katya Salas of Richmond. Mauro feels that they did their best.
“This is their first time really playing together,” he said. “They haven’t even practiced together, so this was a first.”
Breland and Osei also lost their doubles match, falling to Bowdoin’s Kellen Alberstone and Tiffany Cheng 8-5. They also competed together for the first time today.
“We need to improve on shot selection,” Mauro said. “We’re gonna play against Dartmouth tomorrow.”
Osei feels that they can improve.
“It’s just minor errors,” she said. “We just have to close out games and focus a little more.”
The tournament continues tomorrow. The only Temple player that will play a singles match is Doms, who will face off against Amber Washington of St. John’s. Each of the doubles teams will play one more match.
Evan Cross can be reached at evan.cross@temple.edu or on Twitter @EvanCross.
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