Jan. 19, 2012
Coming off a four-match winning streak to open their spring season, the Vanderbilt Commodores head to Evanston, Ill. on their first road trip, where they will face two competitive opponents in Northwestern and DePaul University.
The No. 15 Commodores play DePaul Friday at 3:00 CT before taking on No. 12 Northwestern on Saturday at 11:00 CT. Vanderbilt faced Northwestern in their first match of the spring last year in a hard-fought 4-3 Commodore win.
“Both are good teams. We’re looking to come out and compete hard early, and we expect it to be a war,” said assistant coach Aleke Tsoubanos. “We’ve played Northwestern before, and it was a slugfest that came down to the last match. They’re a really good team, good doubles team. Everyone needs to compete hard, but we’re up for the challenge.”
Northwestern boasts two nationally-ranked players in No. 26 Kate Turvy and No. 86 Brittany Wowchuck, while Vanderbilt has three ranked players in No. 23 Jackie Wu, No. 69 Lauren Mira, and No. 110 Marie Casares.
“We’re so excited to start traveling,” said junior Nelly Radeva. “We played Northwestern last year and it was a huge win for us. We’ve trained hard all through the fall, so we’re ready.”
Sophomore Alex Leatu, who was ranked in the pre-season polls, agrees. “Our team has natural chemistry, and we’re doing a great job finding it on the court,” she said after their last match against Belmont. “We need to stay humble and focused because they’ll be tough matches, but I think we can find it within ourselves to battle through these opponents.”