Feb. 18, 2009
The Purdue women's tennis team fell 7-0 to the 14th-ranked Notre Dame Fighting Irish Wednesday inside the Eck Tennis Pavilion in South Bend, Ind.
"Notre Dame is a really tough team," head coach Laura Glitz said. "But, I thought we competed well and can take a lot of positives from this match."
Purdue (3-4) dropped the first point of the match after being swept in doubles. Notre Dame's No. 2 tandem of Shannon Matthews and Colleen Rielley defeated Purdue's freshman duo of Jennifer Rabot and Remi Martin 8-5. The Fighting Irish clinched the doubles point at No. 3 when Cosmina Ciobanu and Katie Potts beat freshman Anna Dushkina and junior Tatiana Ganzha 8-4. The sweep was completed when Kelsy Tefft and Kristy Frilling, the No. 1-ranked doubles team in the NCAA, defeated senior Stephanie Wooten and junior Michelle Sammons 8-7 (3) at No. 1.
Notre Dame (7-1) carried its momentum from doubles into singles play. Matthews defeated Martin 6-0, 6-1 at No. 5, and Frilling, ranked 39th in singles, beat Wooten 6-1, 6-1 at No. 2. Tefft, the 45th-ranked collegiate singles player, defeated Sammons, who played at No. 1 singles for the first time this season, 6-1, 6-0 to clinch the match.
At No. 6 singles, Potts defeated Dushkina 6-1, 6-2 to push Notre Dame's lead to 5-0. The next match to finish was No. 3 singles, where 62nd-ranked Kristen Rafael beat Ganzha 7-5, 6-2. The final margin was reached at No. 4 when Ciobanu handed Rabot just her second loss this season 4-6, 6-3, 1-0 (6).
Notre Dame is the highest-ranked team Purdue has faced this season and the highest since Purdue faced No. 1 Northwestern on March 29, 2008. The Boilermakers travel to State College, Pa., this weekend to face Oklahoma on Saturday before opening the Big Ten season Sunday against Penn State.