POCATELLO, Idaho – The Idaho State women's tennis team opened Big Sky Conference play this afternoon at home in Reed Gym versus the Portland State Vikings. Idaho State comes into the match defeating PSU in four of their last six meetings, however, Portland State took the win in their matchup last season, defeating ISU 5-2 in Portland, Oregon.
Beginning in the doubles matches, the first duo for ISU to wrap up was in the #1 doubles match where the O'Lideadha twins would take care of business, downing the Vikings' duo of Sanoner/Perkins, 6-4. The second doubles match to wrap up was the #2 match where
Asem Shoybek and
Stefanya Shalakhova were unable to pull it out, just falling to Buekers/Yoshimura 6-7 (5-7). The doubles point would all come down to the #3 doubles match, where
Hana Cho and
Sydney Morris would face the same fate as their teammates on court 2. Just falling 6-7 (5-7) to Ohara/Stronina, allowing the Vikings to come out of nowhere and win the doubles team point heading into singles play.
As we began the singles matches the first matches to wrap up were the #1-3 matches. In the #1 singles spot
Hana Cho would fall to E. Strongina 3-6, 4-6. Now with ISU down 0-2 they needed to turn things around fast if they wanted a chance at victory. The O'Lideadha twins must have known this as they would come away with clutch victories.
Lola O'Lideadha would take the win in the #2 singles match 6-2, 6-4 over N. Beukers, and
Sol O'Lideadha would come from behind and take the win in the #3 singles match 3-6, 6-0, 6-4 over PSU's M. Ohara. Now with the team scores knotted up at two apiece it would come down to the final three singles matches. In the #5 singles match
Megan Lang-Gould would fall to S. Perkins 4-6, 2-6, meaning the Bengals needed to win-out if they wanted to earn their first conference win on the season.
Stefanya Shalakhova would come through for Idaho State in the #6 singles match, crusing to a 6-4, 6-2 win over M. Egan. The match would come down to the #4 singles match, where
Asem Shoybek was fighting off M. Yoshimura all match long. At the end of the day, Shoybek would prove to be too much and would come out on top 6-3, 6-7 (5-7), 6-0. Giving Idaho State the come from behind victory over Portland State, 4-3.
Following the win, the Bengals are winners of their last 4 in a row, and improve to 5-3 overall and 1-0 in Big Sky play. After the loss Portland State will drop to 3-4 on the season, and moves to 1-1 in conference play.
Head Coach
Gretchen Maloney shared her thoughts on the team's comeback win, "What an incredible team effort today. The doubles point was a nail biter but the girls fought hard in singles to get the win. So much grit and determination from this group!"
Idaho State's next match will be in two weeks, on Friday, March 8
th, as they travel to St. George, Utah for their second match of the season against the Utah Tech Trailblazers.
