Rice University Athletics
North Texas Downs Owls, 5-2
4/5/2009 12:00:00 AM | Women's Tennis
April 5, 2009
The North Texas Mean Green leveraged three tie-breaker victories to defeat the Rice Owls 5-2 decision at Jake Hess Tennis Stadium on Sunday.
North Texas grabbed the doubles point thanks to a tie-breaker at the No. 2 position, and added wins at No. 1 and No. 5 singles in the same fashion.
After UNT grabbed the doubles point, the Owls struck back to take a 2-1 lead thanks to wins in singles by Ana Guzman and Rebekka Hänle. Rice also took first sets at No. 5 and No. 6, but saw North Texas battle back to win both matches.
"Alex and Rebekka did a nice job getting us out to an early lead in the doubles and really executed well," Rice head coach Elizabeth Schmidt said. " In some spots, we did not do a very good job rebounding after losing a very close doubles point. Against a quality opponent like North Texas you cannot afford mental lapses or loose points because they will take advantage of it," she added.
The Owls will wrap up their 2009 regular season when they host SMU on Friday at 2 p.m. and Northwestern State at 9 a.m. on Saturday. They will host the 2009 C-USA Women's Tennis Championships at Jake Hess, beginning Thursday, April 16.
"We will work hard this week in practice on some very specific things we saw today and are looking forward to playing conference foe SMU on Friday," Schmidt said.
Tennis Match Results
North Texas vs Rice
4/5/2009 at Houston, Texas
(Jake Hess Tennis Stadium)
North Texas 5, Rice 2
Singles competition
1. Irina Paraschiv (NT) def. Julie Chao (RICE) 6-1, 7-6 (9-7)
2. Rebekka Hänle (RICE) def. Madura Ranganathan (NT) 7-5, 6-
1 3. Ana Guzman (RICE) def. Catalina Cruz (NT) 6-2, 6-4
4. Paula Dinuta (NT) def. Jessica Jackson (RICE) 6-2, 6-0
5. Narine Kazarova (NT) def. Rebecca Lin (RICE) 1-6, 7-5, 6-3
6. Amy Joubert (NT) def. Varsha Shiva-Shankar (RICE) 6-7 (10-12), 6-4, 1-0 (11-9)
Doubles competition
1. Madura Ranganathan/Amy Joubert (NT) def. Julie Chao/Ana Guzman (RICE) 8-4
2. Catalina Cruz/Narine Kazarova (NT) def. Rebecca Lin/Jessica Jackson (RICE) 9-8 (9-7)
3. Alex Rasch/Rebekka Hänle (RICE) def. Irina Paraschiv/Rachel Wilhelm (NT) 8-5
Players Mentioned
