Sophomore Vanja Cado swings at the ball during a singles match against Texas Christian University on Feb. 1 at Bayard H. Friedman Tennis Center in Fort Worth, Texas. Cado left her third singles match unfinished.
UTA women’s tennis finished its Big 12 conference bout with a 4-0 loss to Texas Christian University on Sunday at the Bayard H. Friedman Tennis Center.
Head coach Diego Benitez opened the reformed women’s tennis team with a three-game stretch against some of the toughest opponents the Mavericks will face all season, with the season opener against the University of Houston, and back-to-back matches against the University of Arizona and Texas Christian.
Graduate Elizaveta Mladentseva swings at the ball during a singles match against Texas Christian University on Feb. 1 at Bayard H. Friedman Tennis Center in Fort Worth, Texas. Mladentseva lost her singles and doubles matches.
“We can play against anybody in our schedule, that’s what I was telling the girls,” Benitez said. “We’ve been practicing really hard. Obviously, we have a young team. For a lot of them, this is very, very new, it’s just getting used to the whole system and how playing a college match is.”
Doubles play set the tone early, as all three Maverick duos lost or lagged with a definitive deficit. The freshman duo of Tasnime Ahamout and Natalia Gonzalez had the closest outcome, reaching 5-2 before leaving the match unfinished.
The duo of freshman Diana Kaibara and graduate student Elizaveta Mladentseva was the deciding factor in Texas Christian’s first point of the match, falling 6-1 shortly after sophomore Vanja Cado and freshman Flora Farkaslaki.
Sophomore Vanja Cado cheers after scoring during a tennis match against Texas Christian University on Feb. 1 at Bayard H. Friedman Tennis Center in Fort Worth, Texas. Cado lost her doubles match 6-0.
Despite Kaibara and Mladentseva’s loss, the two shared smiles throughout the doubles match. A point lost was a laugh earned, a representation of the two’s relationship that has grown since their introduction in the fall.
“Me and Diana have a different kind of bond, because we both from the same country and we speak the same language, so that helps a lot,” Mladentseva said. “She’s like my little sister, because she’s a freshman and I’m a super senior. So yeah, she’s like my little baby.”
After losing the doubles point and heading into singles competition, the Mavericks ran into the same wall as in singles, dropping three points on three separate courts within seconds of one another. Gonzalez was first to fall, losing in straight sets to Texas Christian’s sophomore Cayetana Gay.
Freshman Flora Farkaslaki shakes hands with a Texas Christian University player after a doubles match with sophomore Vanja Cado on Feb. 1 at Bayard H. Friedman Tennis Center in Fort Worth, Texas. Farkaslaki left her second singles match unfinished.
Mladentseva’s game against senior Yu-Chin Tsai was tightly contested and decided UTA’s fate for the day, ending with a 6-4 set. Mladentseva said she was unable to capitalize on deuce points, a lot of opportunities that didn’t go her way.
Three of the matches were left unfinished in singles play following Mladentseva’s competition. Kaibara and Cado’s matches both saw a 6-3 set one, with Cado’s coming down to the wire in set two.
“The second set, it was super close. I was down 3-4. But then I had game points, so it could have been four all,” She said. “You never know what happens after. I was really, really going for it and playing well. So it was sad that we had to stop it, because I think it would have gotten better.”
Freshman Diana Kaibara kneels with her head down during a singles match against Texas Christian University on Feb. 1 at Bayard H. Friedman Tennis Center in Fort Worth, Texas. Kaibara left her third singles match unfinished.
UTA women’s tennis will look ahead to back-to-back games against UT Dallas at 10 a.m. and Lubbock Christian University at 2 p.m. Saturday at the UTA Tennis Center.
“They need to understand that they’re in the right path. They need to trust the process. They need to trust the system,” Benitez said. “They need to trust each other and the coaches, especially when you have a couple of tough losses in a row. I don’t expect any problem in that matter, they work really hard.”
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