Feb. 24, 2016

COLUMBIA, S.C. — Junior Caroline Dailey of the No. 17 South Carolina women’s tennis team earned SEC Player of the Week honors, the league office announced Wednesday. It marks the first time in her career she has won the award and the second weekly award for the Gamecocks this season as teammate Ingrid Gamarra Martins was named SEC Freshman of the Week earlier this month.

With South Carolina trailing Clemson 3-2, the Sarasota, Fla., native pulled off an impressive 7-6 (6), 6-4 victory over Clemson’s Joana Eidukonyte, the nation’s then-11th-ranked player, to level the score at 3-3. The Gamecocks eventually went on to take the victory over the Tigers, giving them their first win against Clemson since 2010.

Dailey’s straight-set triumph marks the program’s highest-ranked singles win since 2009, when Gira Schofield beat the nation’s sixth-ranked player. Her performance catapulted her into the Oracle/ITA singles rankings for the first time this spring, coming in at No. 71.

As a team, South Carolina is 7-2 this season with a pair of wins over top-25 opponents in non-conference play for the first time in over 20 years. The Gamecocks take on No. 27 Wake Forest at 2 p.m. this Sunday in Winston-Salem, N.C.