Women’s tennis comes back against UCSB

The No. 2 Trojans tennis team won its first dual match of the season against No. 59 UC Santa Barbara by a close score of 4-3.

Both teams battled back and forth all throughout the matches, with UCSB holding the lead for a majority of the match, until the Women of Troy came through with a strong finish to win.

The Trojans started slowly in doubles, with all three teams falling behind early.

The No. 2 doubles team of Zoë Katz and Jessica Failla were able to win four straight games against the Gaucho’s Melissa Baker and Jaimee Gilbertson after trailing 2-4 to win the first of the three doubles matches.

The top-five, nationally-ranked team of Giuliana Olmos and Gabby Smith fell to UCSB’s 21st ranked doubles team of Palina Dubavets and Stefani Stojic by a score of 3-6 in a tough match where it seemed Dubavets and Stojic were hitting every shot just out of reach of the Olmos and Smith team.

In the decisive match, the Trojans again fell in a tight 4-6 set; this time Lou Adler and Amanda Atanasson soon defeated sophomore Madison Westby and Meredith Xepoleas on court three. This put the Trojans in a 0-1 hole to begin the match, but they were able to regroup before singles play.

USC started with a battle, splitting the first sets 3-3.

Freshman Jessica Failla, playing No. 4 singles in her first career dual match, got the Trojans on the board with a commanding 6-1 final set win after taking an incredibly close first set 7-6, looking past complaints by her opponent Gilbertson about line calls.

Katz lost a tough battle at the No. 5 singles spot, losing 3-6 in the first set.

After fighting off many chances by Atanasson to close out the match, Katz was finally defeated 6-7 in the second set to give the lead back to UCSB.

Westby, ranked 49th in the nation, won a quick first set 6-0, and after losing the second 4-6, broke her opponent’s serve in the first game of the third set and dominated the rest of the way, winning the third set 6-0 to even the total match at 2 apiece.

The Trojans’ captain and highest nationally ranked player No. 42 Olmos gave USC its first lead of the match in the matchup between each team’s top player.

After grinding out the first set 7-5 over Stefani Stojic, Olmos won a second set tiebreaker 7-3 to win the second set 7-6 and clinch her match, giving the Women of Troy a 3-2 lead overall.

Sophomore Gabby Smith was engaged in a back-and-forth match on court two with neither player looking to give up anything.

She lost the first set to Dubavets 5-7 after a late break, then had a late break of her own to take the second set 6-4.

The third set continued the trend, with Dubavets beating Smith 3-6 to secure the match, leading to the court six matchup of Xepoleas and Stephanie Yamada being the decisive match.

Xepoleas lost a close first set 3-6, got up 3-0 quickly in the second and finished off the set with a 6-4 win. All eyes turned to the final set which would decide the victorious team.

After being tied 4-4, Xepoleas was able to secure a break and win the set 6-4, clinching the match for the Trojans in exciting fashion.

The Women of Troy picked up where they left off after their stellar 2015 season, and they hope to continue their winning ways next Friday against Pepperdine at Marks Stadium.