Eagles see success at Enchanted Valley Showdown
Consistency was on full display for Carson-Newman women’s tennis as they finished their time in the Enchanted Valley Showdown on Sunday.
YOUNG HARRIS, Ga. – Consistency was on full display for Carson-Newman women's tennis as they finished their time in the Enchanted Valley Showdown on Sunday. The women's team were looking to continue their impressive results from day one on Saturday.
To start Sunday off, the Eagles went head-to-head against the Lee Flames in doubles action starting at 9 a.m. Sunday morning.
"The girls had a good weekend as well. Even though we have some work to do, doubles were significantly better this weekend than last tournament," graduate assistant Gabriel Dabdab said.
The first doubles team in action would be the pair of junior Anita Chornei (Kyiv, Ukraine) and freshman Maria Ulloa (Cuba) as they went up against Wieser and Trammell of Lee. The Eagles started off their day with a solid 6-1 victory to continue their success from Saturday.
Carson-Newman then saw graduate student Hannah Price (Knoxville, Tenn.) and junior Natasha Forrest (Jersey, United Kingdom) take to the courts against Maiz and Donaldson of Lee as the Eagles once again won, this time 6-3.
The doubles pairing of senior Ana Carla Resende (Minas Gerais, Brazil) and sophomore Summer Reeves (Maidstone, Kent, England) were back together as a pairing. After winning their match on Saturday, Resende and Reeves left no doubt on Sunday as they defeated Kirr and Ragastovac of Lee, 6-0.
Finally, the duo of Anita Chornei and sophomore Julia Speiser took to the courts together for the first time this weekend against Weiser and Trammell of Lee. Chornei would be able to go 2-0 against the Flames pairing as she and Speiser collected a 7-5 victory and helped C-N secure a 4-0 start to start their Sunday of matches.
After completing action versus the Flames, Carson-Newman moved onto singles action against the hometown Mountain Lions of Young Harris and Breanu.
In the first C-N versus Breanu singles match, Summer Reeves would be in action against Zambrano in early Sunday singles action. The England native was consistent all weekend, winning her match over Zambrano, 6-3, 6-2.
Fellow sophomore, Julia Speiser, would continue C-N's winning ways as she defeated S. Brannon from Breanu by a result of 6-2, 6-0.
Maria Ulloa has been able to see a strong start to her first season as an Eagle, continuing her wonderful court play as she was handed a victory over Gouveia of Breanu after the opponent had to retire in the second set. The decision came after Ulloa won the first set, 6-1.
The final Eagle in the first round of singles action of C-N was Anita Chornei. She would go up against Wright of the hometown Young Harris Mountain Lions, winning in straight sets 6-0, 6-0.
Sadly, the Eagles did see one athlete suffer an unfortunate loss in singles action. Natasha Forrest was going up against M. Brannon of Breanu as she dropped the first set, 1-6. In the second set, the match got to 5-5 apiece before Forrest was forced to retire and thus, Brannon was declared the match winner.
Finally, to conclude their time in the Peach State, Carson-Newman continued action against the Mountain Lions in singles.
Ana Carla Resende was on a mission to end her time in the Peach State on a positive note. She came into Sunday after winning her singles match on Saturday, as she was going up against Ratiu of the Mountain Lions of Young Harris. The match was only one game away from being a clean sweep, but Resende still kept her hot start to the fall season alive as she won 6-0, 6-1.
Ulloa was also able to see a second singles match on Sunday, this time against Wilson of Young Harris. Much like her teammate Resende, Maria Ulloa was looking to defeat her Mountain Lions opponent. The freshman was successful as she won her second singles match on the day, 6-2, 6-2.
The other Eagle who took to the courts and came out victorious would be Anita Chornei, looking to also finish her Sunday 2-0 in singles. The Ukraine native would do just that as she finished her time at Young Harris with a 6-0, 6-1 victory over the Mountain Lions' Gomez.
Sadly, much like in the first set of singles matches, there would be one Eagle who was just short of victory. Summer Reeves and her Young Harris opponent, Mallath, would take part in a thrilling three-setter to decide a winner. Reeves would drop the first set, 3-6, before responding and claiming the second set 6-4 and setting up the decisive third set. However, her efforts would not be enough as Mallath defended home-court advantage and took the victory with a 10-6 result in the third set.
"A shoutout to the entire team, but especially Julia, Anita, and Maria who came out and gave us a strong and high level of tennis this weekend," Dabdab said.
Over the duration of the two-day event, Carson-Newman women's tennis finished with an overall record of 17-4 across both singles and doubles.
As the Eagles will prepare to wrap up their fall portion of the schedule, C-N will now prepare for the Eagle Invitational in Knoxville, Tenn. on October 22 and 23.
Be sure to keep up with the C-N women's tennis team all season long across Carson-Newman's social media platforms and on cneagles.com
