A year after Texas came to Durham and upset Duke in the second round of the NCAA tournament, the 15th-seeded Blue Devils made sure history did not repeat itself with another team in orange on the other side of the court.
Duke took down Tennessee 4-1 Saturday afternoon at Ambler Tennis Stadium to clinch its first berth in the Round of 16 since 2014. The Blue Devils won a close doubles point and then captured three singles matches in straight sets, as the Volunteers stayed competitive but were never able to get the momentum on their side.
After Duke’s 42nd-ranked doubles team of Kaitlyn McCarthy and Meible Chi cruised past No. 71 Brittany Lindl and Eve Repic on Court 1, both of the other doubles matches went to tiebreaks at the same time. Alyssa Smith and Chalena Scholl quickly ended the drama for the Blue Devils, controlling their tiebreak for a 7-6 (7-3) victory.
“Tennessee’s won most of their matches at 2 doubles, so I knew that would be a good match,” Duke head coach Jamie Ashworth said. “We played a really good tiebreaker at 2 doubles, and that momentum carried off into singles.”
But the doubles portion of the match did not come without a cost.
Samantha Harris—the Blue Devils’ top singles player—injured her back on the first point of her doubles match. She served underhanded for the rest of the match, which ended unfinished in the middle of a tiebreak, and had to sit out singles.
Harris has now sat out singles in two straight matches, first to rest in Duke’s first-round victory Friday against Boston University.
Saturday’s absence, however, was unplanned.
“She grinded out the doubles as best as she could, but I said to [associate head coach Marc Spicijaric], ‘Look at Sam move. She can’t move,’ Ashworth said. “We had every intention that she was going to play [singles].”
Ashworth said he expects Harris to be ready for the Round of 16 next week, but with the junior out, the Blue Devils (22-5) had to scramble to move everyone up a court and insert junior Rebecca Smaller on Court 6. Despite the change of plans, Duke had little trouble rising to the occasion.
The Blue Devils won the first set in four of their six matches, and although Tennessee (19-12) evened the score at one when Ariadna Riley beat Alyssa Smith 6-3, 6-1 at No. 4 singles, No. 43 Chi quickly put Duke back in front with an easy 6-1, 6-2 victory against No. 42 Lindl on Court 1.
“It’s the best match she’s played in a long time. She struggled a little bit at the end of the year, but she’s kept working really hard, and she hasn’t let her results affect her work ethic,” Ashworth said. “Someone like that who swings, it’s almost like a shooter in basketball, she’s just got to keep shooting, keep swinging, and she’ll get some confidence.”
The victory snapped a three-match losing streak against top-100 opponents for Chi in convincing fashion.
“I’ve been practicing really well recently, and I feel like now was the time to really step up,” Chi said. “I believed that I could do it, and I have a team around me who believes that we can all do it, and that was just really good to be around.”
Ellyse Hamlin was next off the courts with a 6-2, 6-4 victory at No. 5 singles, to move the Blue Devils within a point of victory. No. 55 Scholl could not seal the deal on Court 2, dropping the second set to Repic, but McCarthy rolled through her second set to give Duke the win.
After trailing 5-3 in the first set, McCarthy won the last four games of the set and 10 of the last 11 games of her 7-5, 6-1 win—her 21st victory in a row.
Smaller was a game away from clinching the match herself, battling back from a rough first set to win the second frame 6-3 and end the match with a 5-1 lead in the third.
“Obviously I’m glad Kaitlyn won, but it would have great for Becky to get that,” Ashworth said. “She was thrown in there with five minutes notice and got off to a slow start, but just kept competing and looked like she was having fun in the moment.”
Now, most of Duke’s team will be entering uncharted territory—the only Blue Devils that have played in the Round of 16 are seniors Scholl and Smith three years ago.
But a familiar opponent is expected to be waiting in an unfamiliar environment in No. 2 seed North Carolina, which beat Duke 5-2 in Chapel Hill nearly a month ago. This time around, the two teams will face off on the courts at the University of Georgia in Athens, Ga., next weekend, assuming the Tar Heels finish on top of Mississippi Sunday afternoon.
“We had a tough one with them earlier in the year. We just have to believe in ourselves and trust ourselves and play fearless,” Ashworth said. “There’s no pressure on us at all—go out there and just have fun and take advantage of the opportunity."
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