Most Duke fans have Saturday's showdown on the hardwood circled on their calendars. If Mike Krzyzewski’s squad can match what Duke women’s tennis just did against its rival, the Cameron Crazies will be plenty happy.
The Blue Devils knocked off No.11 North Carolina 5-2 in methodical fashion in front of a comparatively docile crowd Sunday at Ambler Tennis Stadium.
“I’m really happy and really proud with how we came out,” head coach Jamie Ashworth said. “The last couple matches we’ve won, but I don’t think we’ve been at our best in all facets.”
Since suffering its first loss of the season, top-ranked Duke (11-1, 3-1 in the ACC) has righted the ship with three consecutive wins, and the squad emerged unscathed from what Ashworth deemed “probably our toughest home weekend all year.”
The doubles point set the tone for the rest of the tight match. On court two, junior Ester Goldfeld and freshman Alyssa Smith fell behind 5-3 before rallying for an 8-6 win against Caroline Price and Whitney Kay, the No. 5 duo in the country.
At the first doubles spot, two top-10 tandems faced off in a back-and-forth affair, with the ninth-ranked pair of Jamie Loeb and Hayley Carter emerging victorious. The North Carolina duo took the final two games to knock off Duke's fourth-ranked doubles team of senior Hanna Mar and sophomore Beatrice Capra by an identical 8-6 scoreline.
Ashworth had stressed that Sunday’s match would come down to a “couple points here and there,” and that was no clearer than in the third doubles match. With junior Annie Mulholland and freshman Chalena Scholl leading seven games to five and North Carolina serving at deuce, a controversial overrule by the head umpire on an apparent double fault gave the Tar Heels' Kate Vialle and Laura Slater a game point.
With North Carolina threatening to stage a comeback, the Blue Devils regained their composure quickly, running off the next three points to take the match 8-5 and claim the doubles point.
“That’s the thing about line calls—they do go both ways, and that one went against us,” Mulholland said. “We knew that it was just one more point that they’d won, and it was just about going out and doing what we needed to do.”
The Blue Devils have lost only one doubles point the entire season. More than anything, winning Sunday’s point was a testament to the team’s depth, which is key for them going forward.
“Depth is a coach’s dream and a player’s nightmare,” Mulholland said. “We change our doubles teams a lot—some of it’s chemistry, some of it’s game style, some of it’s just how people are playing at that point in the season. It was us today, but in the past it’s been other [doubles] teams that have pulled it through.”
At the outset of singles, the Tar Heels (11-3, 3-1) knotted the match at 1-1 when No. 6 Carter knocked off Scholl at the second singles spot, 6-1, 6-0. Duke then quickly regained the lead with straight-set victories at fourth and sixth singles. Senior Rachel Kahan cruised in the sixth position against Tessa Lyons, 6-2, 6-1, and Goldfeld, 18th in the country, proved to be steady in claiming a methodical 6-4, 6-4 victory against No. 83 Kay.
Both Mar and Smith had trickier tasks, as they faced off against lefties and struggled initially. No. 92 Smith dropped the first set to Vialle, and Mar fell behind 5-2 against No. 52 Price.
However, both righted the ships quickly. The 45th-ranked Mar stormed back, winning nine straight games en route to a 7-5, 6-4 win at third singles, and Smith took 12-of-16 games for the 4-6, 6-2, 6-2 victory.
“I’ve been down 5-2 before, and I’ve been up 5-2, but nothing’s ever set,” Mar said. “I just kept fighting for each point. I started to feel myself get a lot of momentum, and I just tried to keep the pressure on.”
For a team without any southpaws, playing against one can be an unwelcome novelty. Ashworth, Duke’s resident lefty, was happy with how Mar and Smith adjusted.
“To be a good player, you have to learn how to be effective against different styles,” Ashworth said. “We don’t harp on it too much, the lefty thing. It affects the serve and it affects your returns a little bit, but they have to be able to adapt, and I think they were able to do that.”
Perhaps the most highly-anticipated singles match was the rematch between Loeb and Capra, ranked first and second in the country, respectively. Capra topped Loeb earlier this season at ITA National Indoors in two close sets, and the showdown Sunday was hotly contested as well, as Capra took the first set 6-3 before Loeb answered in the second.
As all eyes turned to the last match in play, it was ultimately decided by the slimmest of margins. Loeb earned a match point off a net cord that just trickled over, and she took advantage when a Capra forehand fell inches wide to claim the match 3-6, 6-3, 7-5.
Despite losing the individual battle, Duke won the war Sunday—exactly in the manner that Ashworth intended.
“I thought we came out and started on an emotional high. That was our goal. We talked about that the other night after Notre Dame, we talked about it at practice yesterday, we talked about it before the match today,” he said. “It was a good weekend overall.”
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