The Chattanooga women’s team snapped a 13-match losing streak to Middle Tennessee State on Friday, sweeping the visiting Blue Raiders 7-0 at the Hixson Racquet Club.
The Lady Mocs, who hadn’t beaten MTSU since an 8-1 victory in 1999, improved to 3-0 this spring, while the Blue Raiders fell to 1-3.
“We always seem to have a really good battle with them,” UTC coach Jeff Clark said. “A lot of the matches in the previous years were pretty close but haven’t gone our way. The girls were confident tonight and we knew if we played like we were capable of, we would get the win.”
The teams split the first two doubles matches, leaving the No. 3 contest to decide which team received the opening point. UTC junior Alexa Flynn and freshman Katie Polk were knotted up with MTSU’s Flavia Nagayama and Alexandra Torres at 7-7, and the Blue Raiders grabbed a quick 3-1 lead in the tiebreaker.
Flynn and Polk responded by rattling off six straight points to take the win and spot Chattanooga an early advantage.
“The score doesn’t indicate how tight the match was,” said Clark, who is now just two wins shy of 100 for his career at UTC. “We had to go to a tiebreaker to win the doubles and then jumped on them in singles. We didn’t let up. We didn’t let them back in the match like we did last year. They have some fighters on their team, but we just had to stick with the game plan.”
Sophomore Claire Mulyadi was first off the court with her speedy (6-0, 6-0) win over Torres at No. 6, while freshman Kelsey Coots increased the Lady Mocs’ lead to 3-0 with her (6-1, 6-3) victory over Nayara Moraes at No. 5, avenging her (6-4, 7-6) loss to Moraes at the ITA Regionals last fall.
UTC’s Jenna Nurik, the squad’s only senior, clinched her team’s victory with a (6-2, 6-4) win over Yuiri Nomoto.
“It was great,” Nurik said. “I really can't ask for anything more. At the end, I was racing Kaylene to get there first.”
Sophomore Kaylene Chadwell was next off the court with a (6-3, 6-3) victory over Irina Constantinide at No. 2. Freshman Kayla Jones posted a three-set victory at No. 3, while Flynn finished the sweep with a win at No. 4.
“It is a big win, especially for this team,” Nurik said. “Last year, we lost a close one to them, so as a team moving forward it was good to get this one. We can definitely build on this and get