WINSTON-SALEM, N.C. — Following a 4-0 Sweet 16 sweep over the 16th-seeded Miami Hurricanes at the Wake Forest Tennis Center Thursday, the top-seeded Vanderbilt women’s tennis team is back in the NCAA Tournament quarterfinals for the fifth consecutive season.
With the victory, Vanderbilt heads into quarterfinals with a 25-3 overall record, having given up just two points in its last six matches. VU now owns 14 top-25 victories and eight top-10 wins.
The Commodores will face No. 21 Florida State on Saturday at 3 p.m. CT. FSU owns back-to-back 4-3 victories, defeating No. 9 Florida in the round of 32 and Tulsa in Thursday’s round of 16 match.
Thursday’s round of 16 matchup began with stellar doubles play by the second-ranked Commodores, who are now the highest-ranked squad remaining in the NCAA Tournament following No. 1 UNC’s loss to Stanford on Thursday.
No. 11 Fernanda Contreras and Astra Sharma executed near-perfect tennis against No. 68 Estela Perez-Somarriba and Daniella Roldan. The Commodore pairing picked up its 11th victory on the season and sixth straight win with its third sweep.
Miami leveled the doubles opportunity on court three as the Hurricanes’ Dominika Paterova/Ulyana Shirokova broke Amanda Meyer and Christina Rosca‘s 11-match win streak and undefeated record on court three. The Cane tandem earned key deuce points late in the match for the 6-3 win.
No. 69 Emma Kurtz and Emily Smith clinched the Dores’ 13th straight doubles point with a victory on court two. With the match tied at 3-all the Vandy team broke, earned a key 40-all deuce point, then broke again for the 6-3 victory over Sinead Lohan and Ana Madcur.
Vanderbilt kept momentum high heading into singles play, taking all six opening sets.
For the third match in four competitions, Meyer was first off the court with a win for the black and gold. The freshman from Delray Beach, Fla. played efficient tennis on court four, delivering Madcur a 6-3, 6-0 loss. The win was Meyer’s eighth straight victory at the No. 4 singles position.
Ranked No. 44 in the nation as an All-SEC First Team honoree, Rosca came through for the Commodores on court three against Roldan. The sophomore strung together a 6-3, 6-3 victory to give VU the 3-0 advantage. The victory on court three broke a five-match skid, as Rosca’s last completed match came on April 14 in the Dores’ SEC regular season championship against Florida.
VU’s most experienced student-athlete, 11th-ranked Astra Sharma, clinched Vanderbilt’s spot in the NCAA quarterfinals. The clinch was Sharma’s sixth NCAA tournament clinch, with her most notable clinch coming in the 2015 NCAA championship match. Sharma’s victory tied her career-high ranked win, downing No. 3 Perez-Somarriba in the most spirited matchup of the day, 6-4, 6-2. Sharma now owns a 12-1 NCAA team tournament record.
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