The Rock Women’s tennis squad has been busy these past few weeks. After starting out the fall at the Carnegie Mellon Invitational, they competed in a three-day competition at the ITA Atlantic Regional Championships last Thursday, Friday and Saturday.
The Sept. 2 CMU Invitational was a great start for The Rock as five Rock athletes were able to claim wins in singles competition.
Georgie Lancaster, Tina Slovak, Gabriela del Val del Toro, Nuria Martin Lopez and Nicole Kempton all finished with at least one singles victory, with Lancaster and Slovak going 2-0 on the day.
The Rock also won six of their nine doubles matches. Those sets were headlined by Tina Slovak, Amaia Balaguer Brau and Dari Sakhanova who were part of duos winning multiple of their matchups.
Twelve days later they were onto the ITA Atlantic Regional Championships where Slippery Rock athletes competed in 17 singles matches and four doubles matches.
Balaguer Brau went the furthest of any SRU athlete at the competition. The sophomore went 2-0 on the first two days of the tournament going into bracket play. She then won in the round of 16 and the quarterfinals but fell to Kayla Dean of Mercyhurst University in the semifinals.
Del Val del Toro and Martin Lopez also went 2-0 over the first two days and participated in bracket play. They both fell in the round of sixteen to Katy Graydon of Indiana University (Pa.) and Michelle Connor of the University of Charleston.
The White and Green won one of the four matches they were part of in the doubles competition. Del Val del Toro and Kempton made up the victorious duo. They took down Shreya Chakraorty and Juliana Jimenez of Bluefield State University.
Next on the schedule for The Rock is the PSAC Individual Championships.
Last year’s squad saw success with two athletes reaching the singles competition quarterfinals in del Val del Toro and Martin Lopez. Del Val del Toro won her matchup and went on to the semifinals where she lost to IUP’s Karolin Kirchtag.
The Rock also faired well in doubles sets a year ago. Martin Lopez and del Val del Toro won their way through bracket play all the way to the championships. They fell just short at the hands of Dean and Roisin Murphy of Mercyhurst.
The PSAC Individual Championships begin in Bloomsburg, Pa. on Saturday, Oct. 7 and will continue through the weekend until Monday, Oct. 9.
