Ohio State Women’s Tennis Hits the Road for Two Tournaments – Ohio State Buckeyes
9/21/2006 12:00:00 AM | Women's Tennis
Sept. 21, 2006
Columbus, Ohio – The Ohio State women’s tennis team will split its squad and head to two tournaments this weekend. The team will travel to Philadelphia for the Cissie Leary Invitational hosted by Penn and to Winston-Salem, N.C., for the Deacon Classic hosted by Wake Forest. Both tournaments run Friday through Sunday.
The Deacon Classic
The teams competing in the Wake Forest tournament are the host Deacons, Syracuse, Kansas, Indiana, UNC-Charlotte, Dartmouth and East Tennessee.
Competing for the Buckeyes at the tourney in singles will be freshmen Christina Keesey and Ally Mueller, sophomores Julie Blackmore, Sara Kinning and Julie Voss and seniors Ciara Finucane and Kristin Messmer. Blackmore and Mueller, Voss and Messmer, and Finucane and Keesey will make up the Buckeyes’ double teams.
The Cissie Leary Invitational
The teams competing in the Cissie Leary Invitational, on the Lott Courts, are the host Penn Quakers, Minnesota, Massachusetts, Temple, Arizona, Penn State, Cornell, Harvard, Princeton and Columbia.
Traveling to Philadelphia for the Buckeyes to compete in singles are senior Sonia Ruzimovsky, junior Caitlin O’Keefe and sophomore Angela DiPastina. Ruzimovsky and O’Keefe will pair up in doubles as well.
The Season Opener
The Buckeyes opened the 2006-07 campaign at the Princeton Invitational last weekend. The tournament had a hidden dual format.
Friday, only doubles matches were played, with the Buckeye doubles teams combining for a 10-4 record. Freshman Christina Keesey led the way with a 4-0 individual doubles mark, while sophomore Julie Voss was 3-0. Freshman Ally Mueller and sophomores Julie Blackmore and Angela DiPastina each posted 3-1 ledgers.
Saturday and Sunday had singles action. Keesey, Voss and senior Kristin Messmer led the way with 4-0 marks each, while Mueller was undefeated at 2-0.
A Win Under their Belts
The two Buckeye freshmen, Ally Mueller and Christina Keesey, posted their first collegiate wins in both singles and doubles at the Princeton Invitational.
The tandem paired up for their first doubles wins, downing Gordon and Baker of Rutgers, 8-4, last Friday.
Keesey posted her first singles win Saturday, beating Lillian Nguyen of Yale, 6-2, 7-5.
Mueller played her first singles match for the Buckeyes Sunday, beating Buffalo’s Katrine Fisher, 6-4, 6-1.
In the tournament, Keesey was 8-0 combined (4-0 singles, 4-0 doubles) to lead the Buckeyes in wins. Mueller was 5-1 overall (2-0 singles, 3-1 doubles).
Who’s Back
The Buckeyes return all but one player (nine letterwinners) from the 2006 squad. The squad lost senior captain Emily Howard, but returned seniors Ciara Finucane, Kristin Messmer and Sonia Ruzimovsky, juniors Caitlin O’Keefe and Nidhi Shah and sophomores Julie Blackmore, Angela DiPastina, Sara Kinning and Julie Voss.
A Quick Look Back
The Buckeyes fought their way to a 13-13 overall record during 2005-06 while going 3-7 in Big Ten play. In 15 non-conference matches, Ohio State faced six teams that finished ranked in the final 2006 Fila Intercollegiate Tennis Association rankings, including No. 5 Notre Dame. When the Buckeyes entered conference play, the task was not much easier as Ohio State faced five teams that were ranked in the final ITA poll. Eight of the conference’s teams were ranked in the ITA rankings at some point during the year, including Ohio State which was ranked as high as No. 73.
Up Next
The Buckeyes will travel to East Lansing, Mich., for the ITA Midwest Regional Oct. 19-24.
