Women's Tennis . February 28, 2021

LSU Comes Back to Top Gamecocks 4-3

South Carolina Looks to Regroup at Tennessee, Georgia

COLUMBIA, S.C. — The South Carolina women’s tennis team lost a 4-3 contest to No. 19 LSU on Sunday at the Carolina Tennis Center in Columbia, S.C.

The Gamecocks fell to 4-7 and 1-3 in the SEC with the loss, while the Tigers improved to 8-1 and 3-1 in league play.

Doubles Recap

The Gamecocks started strong yet again in doubles, winning the point for the fifth match in a row and their eighth time in 11 matches this season. The No. 20-ranked duo of Silvia Chinellato and Emma Shelton got things started with an easy 6-1 victory on court two over Safiya Carrington and Maggie Cubitt to improve to 3-1 this spring and 6-4 overall.

South Carolina got an early break on court one and never looked back from there. The 29th-rated tandem of Mia Horvit and Megan Davies continued to hold serve from there and with a 5-4 lead, Davies managed one last hold against No. 14 Nina Geissler and Eden Richardson to secure the 1-0 advantage for the Gamecocks.

Court three’s matchup between Allie Gretkowski and Ana Cruz of South Carolina, and LSU’s Taylor Bridges and Paris Corley was suspended with the match on serve and tied at 4-all after Horvit and Davies clinched the doubles.

Singles Recap

It was evident early in the singles it would be a tight match, as LSU and South Carolina split the first sets between the six courts. The Gamecocks captured the first sets on courts one, two and six, while the Tigers came out on top for courts three, four and five.

Megan Davies got the first victory in singles by defeating Eden Richardson on court two in straight sets 6-4, 6-3 to put the Gamecocks ahead 2-0, but less than two minutes later the Tigers answered with Paris Corley taking down No. 93 Emma Shelton 7-5, 6-4 at the third position. Taylor Bridges, ranked No. 41, then tied the match up at 2-all after she came from behind to down No. 34 Mia Horvit in three sets 0-6, 6-2, 6-4 at No. 1 singles.

With the match knotted up at two apiece, the contest came down to three more matches that were all in third sets. Silvia Chinellato was close to finishing on court four versus Maggie Cubitt when Bridges scored her win for LSU. Chinellato held serve for a 5-2 lead in the third and then managed a break to finish off her 0-6, 6-4, 6-2 comeback victory.

The remaining two matches on courts five and six, however, did not fall Carolina’s way. At five, Nina Geissler held off Allie Gretkowski 6-4, 2-6, 6-4 to put the deciding point on court six.

Cruz won the first set at six 6-2 over Samantha Buyckx and had match points with a 5-4 lead in the second set on Buyckx’s serve, but Buyckx fought back to put the set in a tiebreak that she managed to win 7-5. In the third, Buyckx raced out to a 3-0 lead and went on to hold off Cruz to complete her 2-6, 7-6(5), 6-2 triumph.

Notes

South Carolina has won the doubles point eight times in 11 matches this season and won it five times in a row.
Mia Horvit and Megan Davies posted their top doubles victory of the spring against a ranked opponent by downing No. 14 Nina Geissler and Eden Richardson.
LSU won in Columbia for the first time in the series since South Carolina joined the SEC for the 1992 season, snapping a streak of 15 consecutive losses to the Gamecocks in Columbia. South Carolina leads the all-time series 27-7 and is 16-2 overall at home versus LSU.