BENTONVILLE, Ark. – Arkansas Tech and Harding opened the 2018 Great American Conference Women’s Tennis Championships with victories on Thursday from Memorial Park.
The Golden Suns (11-5) knocked off Southern Nazarene, 5-2, to draw Southeastern Oklahoma State in Friday’s semifinals. They swept the doubles points from the Crimson Storm (1-9) as Megan Bell and Teresa Sanchez, Katharina Drebka and Julia Schoch and Annabel Rowlands and Kami Ward combined to drop only five games.
Katie Harris quickly increased the Tech advantage to 4-0 when she defeated Zoe Gray in straight sets, 6-0, 6-1 at the No. 6 match. The Crimson Storm picked up their first point of the contest when Polina Chala handled Teresa Sanchez, 6-2, 6-0 at No. 2 singles. They drew to 4-2 after Noelia Gomez rallied from dropping the first set Katharina Drebka and scored a three-set win at No. 1 singles.
Arkansas Tech closed out the contest with a win from Kami Ward at the No. 3 slot. She won the first set from Anna Garcia in a tiebreaker and followed up with a 6-2 triumph in the second set.
Harding (14-7) trailed all throughout its opening-round contest with Henderson State (4-9) but pulled out the final two singles matches to register a 5-4 win.
Thanks to wins by Lorraine Banimataku and Lorish Puluspene at No. 3 doubles and Annie Shannon and Sydnee Parker at the No. 1 spot, Reddies won two of the three doubles points.
Harding’s Arisa Takanashi avenged a loss in doubles by besting Shannon in the No. 1 singles match. Henderson State regained a one-point lead when Mariah Bartlett recorded a straight-set win at No. 5 against Emily Faulkner. Paulina Kostka leveled the match for the third time when she defeated Puluspene, 6-2, 6-1, at No. 6.
In the first of three matches to go the full three sets, the Reddies’ Banimataku knocked off Hana Folse. Harding’s Gabriella Alves recovered from losing the opening set to win the final two sets by matching 7-5 scores to extend the match to the final singles contest.
Laura Golubic and Thea Minor split the first two sets after each won in tiebreakers. Golubic controlled the final set, winning 6-1, to push the Lady Bisons to the semifinals for a meeting with top-seeded Oklahoma Baptist.
Both women’s semifinals begin at 2 p.m. on Friday.