Freshman Mallory Cecil won the 2009 NCAA women's tennis singles championship Monday.
Cecil had a game plan against unseeded but red-hot Laura Vallverdu: take the feisty player out of her comfort zone by staying inside the baseline and staying aggressive.
Cecil stuck with it all the way through, setting Vallverdu back on her heels on Championship Point and not easing up until she saw the Miami junior's return sail long.
Game, set, match and championship, 7-5, 6-4.
For more than two hours Monday, No. 5 Cecil battled her third Miami foe in the individual tournament's six rounds. For the sixth time, Cecil prevailed in straight sets, outlasting the Venezuelan-born Vallverdu in an all-ACC final and barreling her way to her second national title in less than a week.
The freshman helped lead the Blue Devils to their first team national championship May 20 in College Station, Texas.
"It feels amazing," Cecil said. "Just like with the team, words can't describe how much fight and heart went into this for me, and for me to be out here representing my team and representing Duke, I couldn't ask for more."
The freshman's singles title caps an extraordinary rookie season which saw Cecil leap into the No. 1 position for Duke within three matches. The South Carolina native closed her season with an individual record of 32-4, which she amassed entirely during the spring after arriving at Duke in January. Cecil becomes the second Blue Devil to win the individual championship, following Vanessa Webb's title run in 1998. She is only the 14th player in NCAA history and the first in ACC history to take both the team and individual titles in the same season.
The straight-set final score belied a gritty, tight match at George P. Mitchell Tennis Stadium. The 24th-ranked Vallverdu entered the contest playing with a high level of intensity and riding a 17-match winning streak. Cecil matched the Miami player step for step, and the two traded the first six games on serve.
"[Vallverdu] was doing a really good job of keeping the balls low," Cecil said. "She likes to pull you back behind the baseline and then she likes to drop shot you, so I was taking her balls a little bit earlier, and I was expecting her shot. I think by taking that away from her, I took away a little bit from her game."
The Blue Devil freshman took advantage, dictating the points and pushing her opponent back. She claimed the first break for a 4-3 lead, then fought off three break points to hold serve for 5-3. However, Vallverdu broke back to move to 5-5. Cecil, though, returned the favor, and she closed out the tough frame with a win on serve for the one-set lead.
The second set saw Cecil break early again and go ahead 2-1. She then slowly pulled away to 3-1, 4-1 and finally 5-1.
"I knew [Cecil] was going to come out with big balls," Vallverdu said. "She kept pulling and pulling across, and I thought she was going to go line, which is what I've seen from her. I was just getting pulled out wide a lot, and I didn't know what to do with that ball."
But the junior with a history of coming back wasn't about to let the title slip through her fingers without a fight. A day earlier, the Venezuelan had fought back furiously from 5-2 down to take the set and match from the eighth seed, Georgia's Chelsey Gullickson. Monday, Vallverdu rallied again, taking three straight games to pull back to 5-4 and fending off three match points in the process.
With the championship now on her racket, Cecil converted on her second chance to bring the title home. In the final game, she whipped a superb cross-court backhand to go up 30-15, and a deep forehand gave the rookie 40-15 and match point. Cecil sealed the national championship by using the strategy that had worked for her all match long, moving into the court and watching as Vallverdu's shot dropped out behind the baseline.
"For Mallory through this week, and the team before, I don't think we could have asked for a better two weeks," Duke head coach Jamie Ashworth said. "It's been an unbelievable freshman year for her and an unbelievable year for the whole group."
Cecil admitted she isn't 100 percent sure about her future plans at this point, with the possibility of turning pro a real option. She plans to play some tournaments this summer and is currently slated to be back at Duke in the fall.
For now, though, Cecil is just living in the moment. After all, she has two newly-acquired national championships to enjoy.
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