Bowtell Clinches Battle of the Owls to Send Rice To C-USA Title Match

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The Lead: Anna Bowtell surged back from a first set loss to provide the clinching win to send No. 41 Rice to its eighth consecutive Conference USA championship match with a 4-2 win over Florida Atlantic at the George R. Brown Tennis Center on Saturday. Rice will take on top seed and 37^th ranked ODU at 10 a.m. on Sunday for the conference title.

Doubles: Rice (15-7) pounced quickly on the first point of the match, winning by identical 6-1 scores at the second and third lines, with Bowtell and Victoria Smirnova clinching the point with their win at No. 3 doubles.

Singles: Rice and FAU split the first six sets of singles and each side moved on to win two of the three matches. Smirnova increased the Rice lead to 2-0 with her 15^th singles win of the dual season. After FAU cut the margin to 2-1, Priya Niezgoda pushed the margin back to two with her 13^th win of the year. While FAU answered back to close to 3-2, Bowtell evened her match against FAU's Kristen Thoms at a set each and then closed out the win with a 6-3 win in the third set. At the same time, Diae El Jardi was in a tiebreak and up a set on the next court.

Notes: Rice has matched Tulsa (2007-14) for the most consecutive C-USA championship match appearances. This will be the Owls ninth appearance overall and they are 6-2 all-time in the final and their six championships are the most of any team in C-USA history ODU is making its first appearance in the women's title match after dropping a 4-0 decision to Rice in the semifinals last year.

Elizabeth Schmidt: "Overall, it was a total team effort. Very rarely on every day is everyone firing on all cylinders and that's why you have a team. I think our team really lifted each other up today. I'm proud of them to be able to come through against a really tough FAU team. We knew we were in for a battle today. I thought all three doubles played really solid today. I know two and three won pretty quickly, but I thought one was playing some solid tennis as well… much better than yesterday as a group. In singles, it was three first sets for them and three first sets for us. Really proud of Anna and Diae for really stepping up. Kristine Thoms a really good competitor. If you ask them, I think she's been the rock of their team for the last few years. We knew that Anna was going to have to bring it to get back in the match, but Anna is a really tough competitor and has been a rock on our team for the past two years. I looked down to her court and it looked like she was playing pretty solid in the first set. She just needed to shift some things. Really proud of her for stepping up in the key moment. All the hard work she's put in helped her believe in that moment."

Up Next: Rice and ODU will decide the C-USA title at 10 a.m. on Sunday. "It's going to be a great match. We played them in the semis last year and it was a battle that came down to the wire. ODU is having a wonderful season and they are a well-coached team. It's going to be a great college tennis match,." Schmidt said.

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