The ‘Cats are off to Malibu!
Northwestern women’s tennis (19-7, 9-2 B1G) is back in the Big Dance.
After missing out on the NCAA Tournament last season for the first time in head coach Claire Pollard’s 25-year tenure, the ‘Cats were drawn to play Arizona State (14-9, 6-4 PAC-12) in the first round of the NCAA Tournament during Monday afternoon’s selection show.
@NUWildcatTennis is in! Watch the ‘Cats’ reaction as they are drawn against Arizona State in Malibu. The winner would face a potential matchup against #6 Pepperdine. pic.twitter.com/bWHN4lGXo4
— Eli Kronenberg (@EliKronenberg) April 29, 2024
“Last year was devastating. It was a really big blow,” Pollard said. “But you don’t wanna just get in. You wanna play well and see if you can advance.”
The Sun Devils clocked in at 27th in the country in the most recent ITA rankings, seven spots ahead of Northwestern. They enter the tournament off the back of a 5-0 loss to No. 10 Cal in the quarterfinals of the Pac-12 tournament. Before that, however, they had been in a rich vein of form, having won six straight matches, five of which were against ranked opponents.
Northwestern’s own start to the postseason came with mixed results as it fell at the second hurdle in the Big Ten Tournament, losing to No. 12 Ohio State in the semifinals. In its first match, NU won an absolute thriller against Nebraska, 4-3.
After a rare loss of the doubles point against the Cornhuskers, Northwestern responded with straight-sets victories from Britany Lau at No. 6 singles, Justine Leong at No. 2, and Christina Hand at No. 3.
That meant they needed to win just one of the three remaining matches, which all went to a third set. Sydney Pratt suffered a disappointing defeat at No. 3, going down 6-2, 4-6, 6-0. No. 5 Kiley Rabjohns had opportunities to close out the ‘Cats’ victory, serving for her match at 6-5 in the second set and holding a 4-2 lead in the third, but ultimately lost 3-6, 7-6 (7), 6-4 to Ana Zamburek in a rematch of their dramatic regular season clash which Rabjohns won to clinch a 4-3 victory.
Ultimately, it was No. 1 Maria Shusharina who swooped in to save the day, saving a remarkable seven match points en route to 6-3, 1-6, 7-6 (10) victory. Pollard attributed Shusharina’s clutch performance to her on-court demeanor, which she said has improved this year as a result of an easier academic workload (Shusharina is a Chemical Engineering major).
“She’s not as tired, she’s not as emotional, she’s able to stay calmer,” Pollard said. “She was so calm in that tiebreak, it was really fun to see.”
In the semifinals, Northwestern came up against an Ohio State team which it had lost to comprehensively the weekend before. Like in that match, Northwestern took the doubles point, with the No. 2 pairing of Pratt and Neena Feldman and the No. 3 pairing Lau and Shusharina each winning their sets 7-5.
However, that was where the winning ended for the ‘Cats, as they lost all six singles first sets, including two tiebreaks involving Hand at No. 3 and Feldman at No. 6. Leong went down 6-3, 6-0 at No. 2, Rabjohns followed her shortly thereafter with a 6-0, 6-2 defeat at No. 5, Shusharina lost to 18th-ranked Irina Cantos Siemers 6-2, 6-4, and Feldman’s opponent Audrey Spencer sealed the deal with a 7-6 (6), 6-2 victory.
Rabjohns said that the team wishes it could have done better at the Big Ten Tournament, but that they “played really tough and fought at every single spot.” On the Ohio State match, Pollard expressed disappointment. “I’m still racking my head as to why we can’t get that little closer,” she said.
Moving forward, Northwestern will head to Malibu, California for the NCAA Tournament, where it would face regional hosts No. 6 Pepperdine if it were to get through Arizona State.
“We’re obviously super excited that we get to play in Malibu,” Rabjohns said. “We’ll probably leave a couple days early, get used to the weather there, get used to seeing the ocean instead of the lake.” She added that the team is excited to have made it this far but believes they still have “a lot of tennis to play.”
For Pollard, the location was less relevant. “It’s a business trip. This is not vacation,” she said. “We’re going on a business trip to win some tennis matches.”