Arizona women’s tennis fell to No. 5 Stanford 7-0 on Friday afternoon and lost to No. 13 Cal 5-2 on Sunday in Berkeley, Calif.
Senior Lacey Smyth and freshman Lauren Marker produced two impressive wins against Cal.
Marker put the Wildcats on the scoreboard when she upset Cal junior and No. 14-ranked Zsofi Susanyi, 6-2, 6-1. This snapped Susanyi’s eight-match winning streak.
Arizona collected another upset, when the No. 95-ranked Smyth beat the No. 29-ranked Denise Starr, 6-4, 6-2.
Cal’s Anett Schutting, ranked 30th, beat Arizona senior Kim Stubbe to clinch the overall match with Cal leading 3-1.
“I knew that Stubbe had a pretty good match against a Stanford player [No. 39 Krista Hardebeck] on Friday, but she lost on a super tiebreak,” Schutting said. “I knew she was a really good competitor, and I had to really earn the points and work the points. That’s what I did. I was able to use my variety of swings, and I played well today.”
No. 43 Lynn Chi wrapped up the contest by prevailing in the match tiebreaker and winning 3-6, 6-4, 1-0(3) over Arizona senior Akilah James.
Arizona now has a 14-3 (3-2 Pac-12 Conference) record after completing the match, which had been rescheduled to Sunday due to rain the previous day. The Golden Bears have won six consecutive dual matches.
The Wildcats will return home to face off against Utah on Friday at 1:30 p.m.
On the other side of Arizona tennis, the men’s team lost on Saturday to the Cal Golden Bears 4-0 and to Stanford 4-3 on Sunday at home in Arizona.
“We were competitive with those guys,” head coach Tad Berkowitz said. “This is one of the top teams in the conference, and we hung with them.”
Arizona got of to a quick start in doubles against Stanford, as senior Kieren Thompson and sophomore Trevor James made slight work out of Trey Strobel and Jamin Ball to take the match 8-4.
With the fate of the doubles point on their shoulders, junior Sumeet Shinde and sophomore Naoki Takeda rose to the occasion in a tight match versus Maciek Romanowicz and John Morrissey. The duo gave Arizona the 1-0 lead off of the 8-6 win.
Senior Mario Urquidi extended the Arizona lead to 2-0 after winning his match against Strobel in straight sets, 6-4, 6-4.
Then, the Wildcats began to fall like dominoes, as Thompson fell against Morrissey, Takeda lost to Romanowicz and freshman Will Kneale was defeated by Anthony Tsodikov.
With the match tied at three apiece, James fell to Stanford’s Robert Stineman 6-3, 7-5, in the decisive match. The loss moves Arizona to 11-10 on the year.
Arizona hits the road next weekend, as it takes on Washington on Friday and Oregon on Saturday. Friday’s match versus the Huskies will be televised on the Pac-12 Networks at 11:30 a.m.
—Follow Zoe Wolkowitz @zowolko
