AUBURN, Ala. – The No. 17 Vanderbilt women’s team defeated Auburn 5-2 Sunday afternoon in Auburn, marking the Commodores’ second win in the conference weekend opener.
Vanderbilt (8-5, 2-0) earned doubles wins at Nos. 2 and 3 to open the contest 1-0. Liberty Sveke, Taka Bertrand, and Amanda Taylor followed with straight set wins to seal the Commodore victory over the Tigers (5-4, 2-0).
The Commodores continued to improve their doubles record, with Sunday’s win marking the team’s tenth point of the season (10-4). Vanderbilt tandems Courtney Ulery/Sveke and Bertrand/Catherine Newman are undefeated through their last seven pro sets.
Sveke earned the first match win of the singles contest, holding Auburn’s Heather Bybee to two games through two sets (6-1, 6-1). Sveke is undefeated in her last five appearances.
Taka Bertrand and Amanda Taylor followed with straight set victories to take the match win. Amanda Fish fell after the clinching contest to Auburn’s Fani Chifchieva 6-3, 6-1, marking the senior’s first SEC loss of the season. Catherine Newman also fell, dropping a tiebreaker to Alex Haney for her first loss since the ITA Indoors tournament at the beginning of February.
Courtney Ulery defeated Jil Hastenwrath in a super tiebreaker for Vanderbilt’s last match win of the afternoon.
Vanderbilt will look for more conference winning as they host Arkansas on Friday and LSU on Sunday in Nashville.
RESULTS
3/4/07
Vanderbilt 5 Auburn 2
Doubles
1. Haney/Koning (AU) d. #19 Fish/Taylor (VU) 8-7
2. Bertrand/Newman (VU) d. Chifchieva/Chappell (AU) 8-4
3. Sveke/Ulery (VU) d. Hastenrath/Adams (AU) 8-2
Order of finish: 3, 2*, 1
Singles
1. #61 Fani Chifchieva (AU) d. #35 Amanda Fish (VU) 6-3, 6-1
2. #64 Amanda Taylor (VU) d. Melissa Koning (AU) 6-3, 6-2
3. Alex Haney (AU) d. #39 Catherine Newman (VU) 6-3, 6-7, 1-0
4. #96 Taka Bertrand (VU) d. Whitney Chappell (AU) 6-2, 6-4
5. Courtney Ulery (VU) d. Jil Hastenrath (AU) 4-6, 6-2, 1-0
6. Liberty Sveke (VU) d. Heather Bybee (AU) 6-1, 6-1
Order of finish: 6, 4, 2*, 1, 5, 3
