PORTLAND, Ore. – The No. 55 Portland Pilots capped a rigorous three-match Southern California road trip with a 5-2 win over the Loyola Marymount Lions Saturday afternoon at the LMU Tennis Center. The victory improves the Pilots to 14-5 overall and 6-2 in WCC play. It also secures at least a third-place finish in the WCC standings as Portland has just one home match next weekend against Santa Clara remaining on the regular season schedule.
The Pilots played their third match in three days on Saturday after edging San Diego on Thursday and falling to No. 16 Pepperdine on Friday.
"This was the toughest weekend of the season for us," Portland head coach Susie Campbell-Gross said. "Playing three back-to-back outdoor matches in three days is a challenge for any team, especially if you are an indoor team. Our team handled the transition better than we could have hoped and taking two out of three matches is a great accomplishment as it puts us in a great position to pursue a NCAA bid for the remainder of the season. We have improved tremendously over the course of the year and we hope to still be playing in May."
Portland wasted little time in gaining the early edge with wins at the top two doubles positions for a 1-0 lead.
In singles play, junior Saroop Dhatt extended Portland's lead with a convincing 6-2, 6-1 victory at the No. 5 position. Junior Maja Mladenovic followed with a 7-5, 6-3 win at No. 2 for a 3-0 lead. Portland junior Tori Troesch then clinched the match for the Pilots with a 6-1, 6-4 decision at No. 6.
LMU secured its first point of the match at the No. 4 position as Krstine Kouyoumjian outlasted Jelena Lazarevic in three sets.
Pilot sophomore Lucia Butkovska then defeated Jessica Perez at No. 1 singles in straight sets followed by LMU's Anna Romeka holding on in a third set super tiebreaker over Sophie van den Aarssen at the No. 3 position for the final point.
"This is a special group of girls and such a close group of teammates," Campbell-Gross added. "They all know that each player will give everything they have on any given day so they are all ready to put the team on their back in those deciding moments. This is the reason why we were able to pull out so many close ones this year. I keep saying how proud of them we are for everything they do, but I cannot stress enough how hard we have all worked to get to into this position and it is great to see this kind of success happening with our program. These players deserve it all."
Portland will conclude the regular season with a single home match against the Santa Clara Broncos on Sunday, April 19 at the Louisiana-Pacific Tennis Center. The match will start at 11 a.m. and have live video and statistics courtesy of PortlandPilots.com. The WCC Championships are scheduled for April 22-25 in San Diego.
#55 Portland 5, Loyola Marymount 2
Los Angeles, Calif. (LMU Tennis Center)
April 11, 2015
Singles1. Lucia Butkovska (POR) def. Jessica Perez (LMU) 6-3, 7-6
2. Maja Mladenovic (POR) def. Andrea Crespo (LMU) 7-5, 6-3
3. Anna Romeka (LMU) def. Sophie van den Aarssen (POR) 6-2, 6-7, 1-0
4. Kristine Kouyoumjian (LMU) def. Jelena Lazarevic (POR) 2-6, 6-2, 6-1
5. Saroop Dhatt (POR) def. Ellie Grossman (LMU) 6-2, 6-1
6. Tori Troesch (POR) def. Julia Norlin (LMU) 6-1, 6-4
Doubles1. Butkovska/Lazarevic (POR) def. Piller/Grossman (LMU) 6-2
2. Mladenovic/van den Aarssen (POR) def. Norlin/Crespo (LMU) 6-2
3. Perez/Romeka (LMU) def. Gould/Zuidema (POR) 6-0
Order of Finish: Doubles (3,1,2), Singles (5,2,6,4,1,3)
