No. 16 Duke Advances to ITA Kick-Off Championship

Friday, January 22

Durham, N.C.

1:30 PM

Duke University

Portland

No. 16 Duke Advances to ITA Kick-Off Championship

1/22/2016 4:31:00 PM | Women's Tennis

Box Score: Duke 4, Portland 0

By: Duke Sports Information

DURHAM, N.C. – The 16th-ranked Duke women's tennis team once again earned a spot in the ITA Kick-off Weekend championship after the Blue Devils defeated 67th-ranked Portland, 4-0, Friday afternoon in the Sheffield Indoor Tennis Center in Durham, N.C. The Blue Devils (2-0) are set to face 29th-ranked Mississippi State (3-0) in the championship Saturday at 6 p.m.

“It was a really good match for us,” head coach Jamie Ashworth said. “Forgetting the scores, it was a good match to get experience and get people back in the flow of playing singles. We have good players, but we don't have any match recall at this point. Portland competed really well, but I thought, down the road, it was a really good match for us to get people playing matches and on the court.”

For the second consecutive competition, Duke went into singles action up 1-0 after securing the doubles point.

The tandem of freshman Kaitlyn McCarthy and sophomore Samantha Harris led Duke off the doubles courts Friday, defeating the Portland team of Radina Dimitrova and Tatiana Grigoryan, 6-3, at the No. 2 position. The Duke duo remained in control throughout the contest, storming out to a 4-0 lead before Portland pulled back within a game by winning three straight. A timely break gave McCarthy and Harris a 5-3 lead, before the Blue Devils held serve to earn the victory. The pair moved to 6-1 on the year with the result.

Duke clinched the doubles point with a 6-4 win on court three, as juniors Chalena Scholl and Alyssa Smith defeated Portland's Maja Mladenovic and Tori Troesch, 6-4. Scholl and Smith fell behind early, dropping the first three games of the match. Portland's duo won a fourth game, bringing the score to 4-1, before Scholl and Smith won five straight games to earn the doubles point and the pair's first dual match win of the year.

With the doubles point decided, the match on court one between the 26th-ranked team of senior Beatrice Capra and freshman Ellyse Hamlin and Portland's Lucia Butkovska and Jelena Lazarevic remained unfinished, with the score tied at 4-4.

The Blue Devils put in dominant performances in singles action, with Duke picking up wins on courts two, four and five to earn a spot in this year's ITA Kickoff Weekend championship match.

McCarthy, the 29th-ranked singles player, registered her second straight dual match win of the year with a 6-3, 6-1 victory over Mladenovic on court two. McCarthy found herself trailing early, as Mladenovic won the first two games of the first set to take a 2-0 lead. After tying the set at 2-2, McCarthy once again fell behind after Mladenovic took a 3-2 advantage. McCarthy would not lose another game in the set as she won the next four games to earn the first set win. McCarthy never trailed in the second set, dropping just one game, bringing the set to 2-1, before the Cary, N.C., native won the final four games. McCarthy now owns an overall singles mark of 15-2.

On court four, Scholl, the 79th-ranked singles player, outlasted her opponent, Grigoryan 6-2, 3-6, 6-3 for her seventh singles win of the year. Scholl broke Grigoryan with the score tied 1-1 in the first set to take a 2-1 lead that she never relinquished, as she won four of the next five games. In the second set, Scholl led 3-2 before Grigoryan rallied and won four straight games. In the final set, Scholl caught her rhythm and won five straight games. Although Grigoryan would pull within two games, Scholl successfully closed out the match to give Duke a 3-0 score.

Ho's match on court five against Lazarevic proved the deciding contest, with the Wexford, Pa., native winning in straight sets, 6-3, 7-5. Ho was dominant in the opening set, kickstarting the contest with a break and winning four of the next five games. Although Lazarevic brought the score to 4-3, Ho calmly closed out the first set. In the second set, Ho and Lazarevic traded the lead before a Ho break tied the match at 5-5. A hold and a break allowed Ho to earn the Blue Devils their second win of the season and the eighth singles win of her college career.

With the team result decided, matches on courts one, three and six remained unfinished. Capra, the 28th-ranked singles player in the nation, led on court one, 6-1, 4-5 over Butkovska, while redshirt freshman Christina Makarova owned a 6-3, 2-1 advantage over Saroop Dhatt. Hamlin, the 70th-ranked singles player, was beginning a third set with Dimitrova, as the score stood at 2-6, 6-3, 1-0.

“I am anticipating we'll be better tomorrow than we were today,” Ashworth said. “I think we'll have more match recall. For some of the girls that didn't finish today, they started to feel better and better as the match went on. We need to be a little better at the start of doubles, and I'm sure we will be. I'm sure our girls will be excited to play and ready to go.”

#GoDuke