The Duke women's tennis team won eight single matches in a disappointing opener at the Adidas Classic at the Indian Wells Tennis Center in Palm Springs, Calif. The team played in adverse conditions, as temperatures reached 130 degrees on the court.
"Not to use it as an excuse, but there is no way to prepare for 130-degree weather," Duke coach Jamie Ashworth said. "I think it gave some of the teams from California and Arizona an advantage."
Both ninth-ranked sophomore Amanda Johnson and 49th-ranked freshman Kelly McCain each advanced to the quarterfinals of the Flight A bracket. Johnson received a bye in the first round, defeated Annika Benstsson of Florida 6-2, 6-2, but then fell to 44th-ranked Vilmarie Castellvi of Tennessee 6-2, 6-2.
McCain picked up victories over Portland's Courtney Perkins (Portland) 6-1, 7-5 and Cindy Sureephong of Arizona State before losing to fifth-ranked Sara Walker of UCLA 7-6, 3-6,3-6.
Senior Ioana Plesu advanced to the finals of singles play in the Flight B bracket with victories over Portland's Sanja Indic, Northwestern's Stacy Kokx and Tennessee's Brooke Cordell. The finals match was not played.
In doubles play, Duke's teams of Johnson and freshman Susie Abromeit and freshman Saras Arasu/Plesu each won their only matches played. Johnson and Abromeit defeated Ruth Barnes/Marine Piriou (Northwestern) 8-1, while Arasu/Plesu knocked off Lisa Bessman/Sanja Indic (Portland) 8-4. Duke's other team of junior Hillary Adams and sophomore Olga Gvozdenovic won its first match by default over McElroy/Mues (Wisconsin) and then fell to Megan Bradley/Lauren Fisher (UCLA) 1-8 and Marine Piriou/Jessica Rush (Northwestern) 3-8.
Ashworth was especially happy with the play of his freshmen, Abromeit, Arasu, and McClain.
"The three collectively played as well as anybody this weekend," Ashworth said. "It was important for them to get some experience in college, get their feet wet so to speak. It is a very different atmosphere from high school. [The freshmen] were one plus to come out of the tournament."
The coach hopes their positive experience will help them next week at the Riviera All-American Tournament, one of college tennis' grand slams. But for now, Ashworth was disappointed with his team's play.
"We came in with high expectations, but we didn't play as well as we had hoped," Ashworth said. "We just need to play more matches."
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