DAVE HILL/Daily Bruin Senior Staff Freshman
Lauren Fisher reaches low for a ball in last
week’s match.
By Jason Saltoun Ebin
Daily Bruin Contributor
The day UCLA left for the USTA/ITA Women’s National Team
Indoor Championships, freshman Chelsea Godbey learned that she
would be playing in her first collegiate match.
“I thought they were kidding,” Godbey said. “I
thought I was just traveling and not playing. It was a big mental
change.”
UCLA (3-4, 2-0 Pac-10) entered the tournament with a 3-1 dual
match record, a No. 8 ITA national team ranking, the
tournament’s No. 4 seed and a shot at the title. But without
sophomore No. 1 singles Sara Walker, out with a stress reaction in
her left foot, and senior No. 3 singles co-captain Zana Zlebnik,
sidelined due to a degenerate disc in her lower back, a severely
undermanned Bruin team limped into Madison, Wis.
“With Sara and Zana in the lineup we are a top five or six
team,” UCLA Head Coach Stella Sampras said.
Without Walker and Zlebnik everyone moves up two positions,
except for No. 2 singles, which moves to No. 1.
“It is not a great situation, but you have to believe in
your players,” Sampras added.
“I think the whole team was kinda in shock,” senior
co-captain Jennifer Donahue said.
Against Northwestern in the first round, the Bruins were within
two points of being swept in doubles until the No. 2 team of
freshman Mariko Fritz-Krockow and senior co-captain Jennifer
Donahue scored a 9-8 (8) victory.
The win proved to be the only highlight for UCLA, as the heroics
that the Bruins used to avoid the doubles sweep disappeared during
singles play. All six singles fell, with No. 1 junior Catherine
Hawley as the only Bruin to win a set.
“It was a whole different level of tennis than I have
ever experienced,” Godbey said.
After being thrashed by Northwestern, UCLA was given another
chance to prove it could compete with the nation’s best.
With two more matches scheduled in the first-round losers’
consolation bracket, UCLA drew No. 17 Baylor on Friday and No. 19
Ohio State on Saturday.
Against Baylor the Bruins started well, claiming the doubles
point behind winning efforts by the No. 1 team of freshman Lauren
Fisher and junior Petya Marinova and the No. 3 team of Hawley and
Godbey.
But UCLA could not sustain the momentum in singles, with each
Bruin losing her first set in every match. Still, what could have
been another rout quickly turned as the Bruins regained the
momentum, winning the second sets at No.s 1, 2 and 4.
With the match in doubt, Hawley, Marinova and Fritz-Krockow had
to win their final sets for the Bruins to clinch. Marinova beat
Katja Kovac (ranked No. 19 nationally) 2-6, 6-4, 6-4, but Hawley
and Fritz-Krockow could not follow and Baylor finished off UCLA
5-2.
The final day of competition was UCLA’s last chance to
leave Madison with a victory. But Ohio State was up for the
challenge and hungry for a win after also losing their first two
matches.
The first point of the match was decided by the play of No. 3
doubles after the first two matches were split.
Fisher and Marinova won 8-4 but Fritz-Krockow and Donahue fell
8-2. The Buckeyes held strong and the inexperienced team of Hawley
and Godbey, playing together for only the second time this season,
could not pull through, losing 9-7.
Singles play immediately followed and Ohio State maintained its
pressure.
Marinova fell 6-4, 6-0 and Donahue fell 6-0, 6-1.
But the UCLA freshmen, Fisher and Fritz-Krockow, brought the
Bruins back into the match. Fisher (6-4, 6-4) and Fritz-Krockow
(6-4, 7-5) claimed the only two Bruin points on the day. But the
Buckeyes sealed the victory 5-2 as No. 1 Hawley lost 7-6 (4), 7-6
(3).
“It didn’t go as well as we thought, but we all got
more experience,” Fisher said. “It is going to make us
a better team.”
While UCLA lost all three of its matches, top-ranked Stanford
(10-0) edged No. 2 Georgia 4-3 to capture its sixth USTA/ITA
title.
The Bruins will have to play at least two more matches without
Walker and Zlebnik. They face Fresno State Friday at 1:30 p.m. and
Oregon Saturday at 11 a.m, both at LATC.