Poor doubles play continues to doom Jayhawks

By Jason Elmquist     Mar 12, 2006

Megan True
Kansas University freshman Ksenia Bukina returns a serve in her doubles match. Bukina and partner Elizaveta Avdeeva lost their match Saturday as the Jayhawks fell to Iowa at Robinson Courts.

Once again, a poor showing in the doubles matches Saturday had the Kansas University women’s tennis team dropping another home dual.

This time, it was a 4-3 loss to Iowa at the Robinson Tennis Courts.

“It’s a must for us to be out here to compete in doubles,” said KU coach Amy Hall-Holt, whose team lost, 4-3, to Texas Tech a week ago. “We just got outcompeted today in doubles and that’s one thing we’ve been working on … getting that doubles point, and we didn’t prevail in that.”

Christine Skoda and Brittany Brown teamed for the only doubles win for the Jayhawks.

Kansas did have another strong showing in singles play, splitting the six matches.

Megan True

Sophomore Stephanie Smith, a Salina native, had an impressive performance in her first singles match of the spring, taking the No. 6 match, 6-2, 6-2.

“I was just excited to get out there again and play my game the whole time – it felt good,” Smith said.

Freshman Edina Horvath’s 6-2, 6-4 victory over Kayla Berry in the No. 5 match gave the Jayhawks their second point.

It was sophomore Elizaveta Avdeeva, however, who stole the show – and the No. 2 singles point.

After dropping the first set, 6-3, Avdeeva found herself in a 5-1 hole in the second. She captured the next six points to send the match to a tie-breaker.

Her opponent, Hillary Mintz, showed signs of frustration, which Avdeeva used to her advantage.

“I think she kind of knew she had already won something and basically stopped (playing),” Avdeeva said. “And I think that is a reason why I won.”

Avdeeva took the tie-breaker, 10-4, and gave KU its third point for the dual.

“I played a simple game … and I didn’t do any crazy stuff,” Avdeeva said. “And I think I wanted to win so bad, even when I knew we had already lost (the dual).”

Though the native Russian pulled out the victory, Hall-Holt said Avdeeva needed to have that intensity from the beginning of her match.

“I’m proud of her, but we’ve got to have it from start to finish,” the KU coach said. “It’s got to be overall, but I’m excited for her for the win.”

Kansas will look to improve on its doubles matches when it entertains Oklahoma State at 11 a.m. today.

“What we’re going to work on our next match is getting the doubles point first and get some momentum started earlier,” Smith said.

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