CHICAGO, Ill. – No. 18 Gustavus women's tennis opened its 27th NCAA tournament with a 4-1 win over No. 34 Hope (Mich.) Friday morning, May 9, at the University of Chicago's Stagg Tennis Courts.
The Gusties (27-7 overall), who were one of 15 teams granted a first-round bye in the bracket, will face the winner of Chicago and North Central (Ill.) in the regional championship at noon tomorrow, May 10. The host Maroons (20-1 overall) and Cardinals (15-9 overall) face each other in their second round match-up Friday afternoon (May 9).
Gustavus, which entered the tournament having not lost a doubles match since early April, extended that streak against Hope (19-7 overall), claiming the doubles point at Nos. 1 and 2 with a lead at No. 3 when play halted.
Karina Elvestrom (Fy., Minnetonka, Minn.) and
Kaya De Bruijn (Jr., Maasland, Netherlands), the Gusties' selections to the NCAA Individual Championships later in the month, earned the first win of the day, cruising to a 6-1 victory. The regionally-ranked pair took the lead early, conceding their one point with a 3-0 lead before rattling off three points of their own in response.
Meanwhile, at No. 2,
Molly Austin (Jr., Arden Hills, Minn.) and
Lanie Davis (Fy., St. Louis, Mo.) extended their win streak to 11 matches with a 6-4 win to clinch doubles. The Gusties and the No. 2 duo from Hope exchanged games for four tie scores, but Austin and Davis never trailed, taking the lead for good at 5-4.
Allison Szalay (Jr., Des Moines, Iowa) and
Ella De Young (So., Iowa City, Iowa) were leading 5-3 at No. 3 when doubles play concluded.
The Gusties got off to a relatively slow start at singles, dropping the first set at every position except Davis' No. 4 and
Brooke Haddorff's (Sr., Burnsville, Minn.) No. 6. Davis ended the first singles match in under an hour, winning by two scores of 6-1. The Flying Dutch cut the lead to just one point with a victory over De Bruijn at No. 2, 6-4, 6-3, but
Noor Omar (Fy., Fridley, Minn.) bounced back after a 2-6 set one loss, matching Davis with a pair of 6-1 scores of her own to re-extend the lead to two, 3-1.
Austin, who hasn't lost a match at No. 3 singles in her last 10, dropped an uncharacteristic set one, 6-2. The junior, however, returned with a 6-1 win in the second set to force a third alongside Elvestrom, and Haddorff, after Haddorff fell 6-3 in her second set. Austin took a 5-2 lead in set three, looking to clinch the match for the Gusties, but surrendered two games to Hopes's Moran, before playing a nearly perfect final game, 40-15, to win No. 3 and the match for the No. 18 Gusties.
Elvestrom fell 1-6 in her first singles set before battling to a 7-6 win in her second set with a 7-2 tiebreaker. She was up 3-2 in set three before Austin called the match. Haddorff, meanwhile, was leading 4-1 in her third set.
The Gusties have never met NCC in NCAA tournament play and are 0-3 against Chicago (0-2 away), having last seen the Maroons in the tournament in 2017.
